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Author's Note: I'm back, sorry for the long delay. I just couldn't get anything creative flowing. This one sorta cropped up out of nowhere, another one of my attempts to write a gender virus story. I really like this one. Its set in the not too distant future and I hope to continue it beyond this initial story. This first story is completely done but I felt it got a little too long to post as one story, so I'm breaking it up into pieces. I hope everyone really likes this one. Please don't forget to comment and provide feedback, it helps out a lot :D.
 

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1.

Tyler groaned at his sister's newest post:

A montage of her latest buys from some trendy second hand boutique because in her words "retro was in". It was a blatant lie, most of it she found in the back of their mother's closet, packed away as clothes from her teen days in the 2000s. But it wasn't cool to say you were wearing your mother's old castoffs. It was trendier to say you found it while trying to express your individuality or some such B.S.

He never really understood it.

He didn't really understand much of anything when it came to his sister, Kayla. They were twins but they couldn't be more different.

The difference between them was obvious from the moment they stepped into a room. Kayla had this way of moving—like someone had strung her up on invisible wires, pulling her into perfect posture, effortless grace. Every toss of her honey-blonde hair was calculated to draw attention without looking like she was trying. Meanwhile, Tyler slouched through life, hands shoved in the pockets of his perpetually wrinkled hoodie, shoulders curled inward as if he were trying to fold himself into something smaller, less noticeable.

School only magnified it. Kayla floated through the halls like she owned them, a trail of laughter and whispered compliments in her wake. She had the kind of face that made people stop mid-sentence—big, doe eyes, a symmetrical smile that photographers would’ve killed to capture. Tyler, meanwhile, existed in the margins. He ate lunch in the library, not because he particularly liked books, but because the cafeteria’s noise felt like sandpaper on his skull. His idea of socializing was nodding at the librarian when she stamped his overdue books.

He only had two IRL "friends" if one could even call them friends anymore. The rest of his social life was through a gaming headset.

Kayla was a social butterfly. She had numerous friends at school and multiple followers on all her Socials.

At home, it was worse. Family gatherings were a parade of cooing aunts pinching Kayla’s cheeks, uncles marveling at how much she’d “blossomed,” while Tyler hovered near the snack table, pretending he wasn’t counting the minutes until he could escape to his room. Even their parents, who swore they didn’t play favorites, lit up brighter when Kayla walked into a room. Not that Tyler blamed them. She was sunlight personified; he was the shadow stretching behind her.

Such was the life that he was happy to accept.

His phone buzzed, a text from his "friend" Benny:

You see the news. Some sorry sack in Huntsville caught The Bug.

He felt himself growing pale just from the fear of it.

The Bug was not the official name for the virus of course but no bothered to remember the real one. It cropped up out of nowhere a few years back and was terrifyingly life altering. Much like the Covid pandemic from nearly two decades ago but not as lethal. In fact, The Bug had not intentionally killed anymore. It had changed lives though. It wasn't the usual type of virus in that you got sick in the normal kind of sense.

It was the kind that changed you.

Not in little ways either.

It fundamentally altered you on a chromosome level, changing your gender completely. Boys to girls. Girls to Boys. It didn't care your race or ethnicity. It didn't care about social status. When it struck, it left "no survivors" in its wake. The governments of the world were at a lose. It came out of nowhere, struck a few people then moved on just as quickly as it came. It wasn't even consistent either. It could strike one town, inflict several people or strike another town on the other side of the country and infect one.

The only thing they did know was its target. It struck teenagers. The youngest victim was thirteen, the oldest nineteen.

Tyler stared at Benny’s text, thumbs hovering over his phone. He should’ve been used to this—The Bug was always lurking at the edges of conversation, a boogeyman story traded between classes. But Huntsville was only two hours away. His throat felt dry. He typed back: Yeah. Sucks for them. Then, after a pause, added, Hope it stays there.

Benny: Lot of us are skipping class for a few days, you in?

Tyler stared at Benny’s message, the words blurring slightly as his pulse kicked up. Skipping school sounded tempting—less chance of being crammed in a hallway full of potential carriers—but his parents would lose their minds if he tried. Kayla would probably narc on him too, just to watch him squirm. He typed back: Nah. Mom’d skin me alive.

Benny’s reply was almost instant: Your funeral.

Tyler sighed, tossing his phone on his pillow.

He decide to distract himself with some good ole fashion pve zombie slaying.

The glow of the monitor painted Tyler’s room in flickering blues and reds as he mowed down another wave of pixelated undead. His fingers danced across the keyboard, mechanical clicks punctuating each headshot. It was easy to lose himself in this—the predictable patterns of the zombies, the way they always lurched left before attacking. Real life wasn’t this simple. Real life didn’t have respawn points.

He played for hours before the bing.

A notification popped up in the corner of his screen—Benny’s username blinking insistently. Tyler hesitated, then alt-tabbed to the chat window.

Benny’s message was a single line: Dude. Check the news. NOW.

Tyler’s gut twisted as he pulled up the local news site. The headline screamed in bold: Huntsville Outbreak Spreads—Cases Confirmed in Ridgewood. His throat went dry. Ridgewood was his town.

Shit.

Benny: Still planning to go to school tomorrow?

He tried to concentrate on the game after that but he was too distracted. In the end, he finished up his current match and headed to bed. He spent the rest of the night refreshing the local news feed, in hopes that Benny was just messing with him. Sadly he wasn't. Besides the previous outbreak in Huntsville, the confirmed cases in Ridgewood were now two. It was terrifying to think, especially because he could potentially know the infected.

When he woke that morning, he was sore. He'd been sleeping on his side, his hand still clutching his phone. With a groan, he woke before his alarm clock.

Tyler's bedroom was a study in organized chaos—not messy, but lived-in. The walls were bare except for a single faded poster of a band he'd liked in middle school, corners peeling where the tape had given up. His desk, shoved against the far wall, was cluttered with the detritus of teenage survival: a half-empty water bottle, a crumpled granola bar wrapper, and a tangle of charging cables that somehow always knotted themselves overnight.

The morning light sliced through the gap in Tyler’s curtains, landing directly on his face like a personal insult. He groaned, rolling onto his back, and stared at the ceiling where a single, ancient glow-in-the-dark star clung stubbornly above his bed—leftover from some long-forgotten childhood phase. The rest of the ceiling was bare, not because Tyler disliked decoration, but because committing to tape felt like a declaration he wasn’t ready to make. His room wasn’t messy, just… undecided. The kind of space that hadn’t quite figured out what it wanted to be when it grew up.

Groaning, he sat back up then begrudgingly started his morning routine. It was a week day, so that meant school. He couldn't help but wonder if his mother would even let them go. Knowing that The Bug was out there was a pretty scary thing. While it didn't cause the usual illness side effects, it was still a very scary thing. Especially the rumors.

The rumors were worse than the virus itself.

Tyler had spent too many nights scrolling through forums where survivors—if you could call them that—posted their experiences. Boys who woke up with softer jaws, higher voices, hips that swayed without permission. Girls who found themselves broader, rougher, their laughter deepening overnight. But it wasn’t just the physical changes that terrified him. It was the stories. The *alleged* stories. Boys who became vapid, obsessed with mirrors and lip gloss overnight. Girls who turned into swaggering jocks, flexing in locker rooms they’d never entered before. As if The Bug didn’t just rewrite your DNA—it rewrote you.

He’d seen one post from a guy in Norway who claimed his best friend had turned into a girl and immediately started crying over chipped nail polish. Another from a girl in Texas who swore her sister had morphed into a boy and punched a hole in the wall because “it felt manly.” Tyler didn’t know if they were true. He didn’t *want* to know. But the possibility stuck to him like sweat, itching under his skin.

The Bug didn't just change you, it rewrote you.

Tyler dragged himself into the bathroom, blinking against the fluorescent glare. His reflection stared back—same tired eyes, same messy bedhead. He exhaled through his nose, pressing a palm to the mirror just to feel the cold glass against his skin.

For a brief moment, he wondered what it might be like.

The thought slithered into his brain like an uninvited guest: If I caught The Bug, would I turn into Kayla? Tyler blinked at his reflection—same sharp jawline, same stubborn cowlick at his temple. But for the first time, he really *looked*. His fingers traced the angles of his face, wondering if they'd soften. Would his hips widen? Would his voice climb higher, until it matched hers? The idea should've repulsed him. Instead, it settled in his chest with a weird, fluttery weight, like a moth trapped behind his ribs.

Tyler’s fingers lingered on his jawline, pressing into the bone as if testing its solidity. Would it really change? The mirror offered no answers—just his same tired face, same uneven stubble he couldn’t be bothered to shave properly. But the thought wouldn’t leave. *Identical.* The word buzzed in his skull like a trapped fly. Identical to Kayla. Not just twins—mirrors.

He shook off the thought. Now was not the time to scare himself.

The toothpaste tasted bitter, clinging to Tyler’s tongue as he scrubbed at his teeth with mechanical precision. Spitting into the sink, he caught another glimpse of his reflection—dark circles under his eyes, a crease between his brows from too many nights spent squinting at screens. He splashed water on his face, the cold shock doing nothing to dislodge the uneasy weight in his stomach. The Bug was in Ridgewood. Two cases. Statistically insignificant, except when it wasn’t.

He pushed the thought from his mind as he stripped and stepped into the shower. He didn't want to think about turning into a girl while naked. He managed a thoughtless shower before stepping out, to the mirror again.

He grabbed the towel he left lying nearby.

Toweling off, he caught the sound of Kayla’s laughter drifting down the hall—bright, effortless, like wind chimes. His fingers tightened around the towel. She’d probably already heard the news, already spun it into some dramatic story for her friends. Can you imagine? she’d say, tossing her hair over one shoulder. Turning into a boy overnight? I’d die. Tyler exhaled sharply through his nose. Of course she wouldn’t be scared. Kayla never doubted her place in the world.

With the towel wrapped around his waist, he padded out of his ensuite and back into his room proper.

He grabbed a t-shirt and jeans, dressing in his usual lazy manner before heading downstairs.

Kayla was already perched at the breakfast table like she owned it—because, let’s be honest, she basically did. Her honey-blonde hair was effortlessly tousled in that way that took Tyler forty-five minutes and a YouTube tutorial to almost replicate on bad days. Today, it was half-up in a clip that probably cost more than his entire Steam library, tiny rhinestones catching the morning light like she’d strategically placed them to blind him. She wore a cropped sweater that Tyler was pretty sure used to belong to their mom’s 2003 emo phase, paired with borrowed low-waisted jeans that made her legs look endless. The outfit shouldn’t have worked—like someone raided a thrift store during an identity crisis—but of course it did. Kayla could wear a trash bag and still trend on Instagram by lunch.

Their mother hovered by the coffee maker, still in her robe, scrolling through her phone with the intensity of a detective reviewing evidence. “Two cases,” she murmured, more to herself than anyone. “Both at Ridgewood High.” Her gaze flicked to Tyler as he shuffled into the room, still rubbing sleep from his eyes. “You’re not going.”

Kayla was the first to react:

"What?" Kayla's fork clattered against her plate, her perfectly plucked brows shooting up. "Mom, you can't be serious. It's two people—out of, like, two thousand." She flicked her hair over her shoulder with practiced nonchalance, but Tyler noticed how her fingers lingered near her collarbone, tapping nervously.

"It only takes one" their mother responded vehemently.

Tyler froze mid-step, his socked foot hovering just above the kitchen tile. His mother's words sank in slowly, like ink dispersing in water. Not going. The relief was immediate, a loosening in his chest he hadn’t realized he’d been holding. But Kayla’s reaction—her sharp inhale, the way her nails dug into the tablecloth—made his stomach twist. He knew that look. It was the same one she’d worn when she’d talked their parents into letting her go to that party last summer despite the “dangerous weather warnings.”

It was always about her image.

"Mom" she whined. "I have to go today. My friends..."

"Are no doubt having this very same conversation with their parents" their mother interrupted. "In fact, Rosemary and I discussed it last night. I assure you, Jessica will not be there"

"This is ridiculous" Kayla huffed, crossing her arms like a petulant child. "Nothing's going to happen"

Tyler stood there, watching the argument unfold like a spectator at a tennis match. His mother’s lips pressed into a thin line, her knuckles white around her coffee mug. Kayla’s face flushed pink, her jaw set in that stubborn way that usually meant she’d win. But this time—this time, something was different. Their mother didn’t budge.

Tyler hovered by the fridge, half-expecting his mother to cave like she always did. But her grip on the mug only tightened. "I've already emailed your teachers," she said, voice firm. "We'll figure out remote learning until this blows over."

There it was. He saw it in his mother's eyes. The final answer. He inwardly sighed. At least Mom was being level headed about it all.

Tyler didn’t realize he’d been holding his breath until his lungs burned. He exhaled sharply, watching Kayla’s face twist into something dangerously close to panic. Her fingers curled around the edge of the table like she might flip it—wouldn’t be the first time—but their mother’s stare didn’t waver.

"Kayla Marie Carver" Their mother only used their full names when she was really pissed. "That's enough. Your social life will survive a few days"

Kayla made a big huff as she stood up and stormed out of the room.

Just like a child.

Tyler and his mother pretty much sighed at the same time.

Kayla's bedroom door slammed with enough force to rattle the family photos in the hallway. He exhaled slowly, pressing his palm flat against the fridge door. The cool metal grounded him—something solid in a world that suddenly felt like it was tilting sideways.

"Dramatic much" he said under his breath.

The silence in the kitchen after Kayla’s dramatic exit was thick enough to chew. Tyler’s mother pressed her fingers to her temples, exhaling slowly like she was counting backward from ten. Tyler knew that look—it was the same one she wore after parent-teacher conferences when Kayla’s teachers gushed about her “vibrant personality” while tactfully avoiding the word disruptive. He grabbed a box of cereal from the pantry, shaking it just to fill the quiet.

"Thank you for not fighting me on this" his mother said, dropping into an empty chair at the table.

"Why would I?" he asked, doing the same. He spooned some Fruit Loops. "No offense but I'm not itching to turn into a girl".

His mother softly smiled. "And I'm definitely not keen on having two of her".

They scared a short laugh. There was humor there but so much more as well.

He was able to eat his breakfast in silence for once. Afterwards, he washed his dish and went back upstairs. The soft sound of music throbbed down the hall from the direction of Kayla's room. It was some catching Asian infused pop song.

Tyler paused outside Kayla’s door, the bass line of her music thrumming through the wood. He could picture her sprawled on her bed, scrolling through her phone with that practiced look of indifference—the one that never quite reached her eyes. For a moment, he considered knocking. Then he remembered the way she’d stormed out, the way she’d looked at him like he was somehow complicit in this. His fingers curled into loose fists at his sides before he turned away.

It was better to let her deal with her shit on her own.

Tyler slouched back into his room, the muffled pop music from Kayla’s room still pulsing through the walls like a second heartbeat. He flopped onto his bed, grabbing his phone—three texts from Benny, all variations of DUDE U OK??—and a missed call from someone he never thought to hear from again.

Callie.

His other "friend".

Tyler stared at Callie's name on his screen like it might bite him. They'd been inseparable once—back when life was simpler, when friendship meant sharing popsicles and scraped knees. He could still remember her grinning at him with missing front teeth, dirt smeared across her freckled cheeks as they dug for worms in his backyard. But then middle school happened. Hormones happened. Callie grew curves and confidence while Tyler grew taller and quieter, until one day they were just two strangers who used to know each other's favorite candy.

When they passed in the halls or met in class, they were polite but that was it.

Tyler’s thumb hovered over Callie’s contact, the missed call notification glaring at him like an accusation. They hadn’t spoken in months—not since that awkward group project where she’d paired off with some lacrosse player and Tyler had ended up doing all the work. His stomach knotted. Why would she call now?

He spent a few minutes wondering to call when he finally just did it.

The phone rang twice before Callie picked up, her breath ragged like she'd been running. "Tyler?" Her voice cracked on his name, too loud and too sharp—nothing like the careful, measured tone she used with everyone else now.

"Hey." He rolled onto his back, staring at the lone glow-in-the-dark star on his ceiling.

Hey? Really? That's what he says?

God, I'm an idiot, he thought, mentally kicking himself.

Callie didn’t seem to notice his idiocy. "You—you saw the news, right?" Her words tumbled out too fast, like she’d been holding them back for hours. "About Ridgewood? The Bug?" There was a wet hitch in her breath that made Tyler sit up straighter. Callie didn’t do vulnerable. Not anymore.

"Yeah," he said, gripping the phone tighter. "Benny texted me last night." The silence stretched between them, thick with all the things they hadn’t said for months. Tyler cleared his throat. "You okay?"

A muffled noise came through the line—half-laugh, half-sob. "No." The word cracked open between them. "My parents are freaking out. They won’t let me leave the house, not even to walk the dog." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "I think my mom’s crying in the kitchen."

Tyler blinked at the ceiling. Callie’s mom was a no-nonsense ER nurse who’d stitched up his knee when he’d wiped out on his bike in fifth grade without even blinking. The idea of her crying over anything was surreal. "Shit," he said lamely.

"They think it’s already here." Callie’s breath hitched. "At school. They won’t say who—just that it’s someone in our grade." The unspoken question hung between them.

Tyler sat up slowly, the mattress creaking under him. His pulse thudded in his ears. Ridgewood High wasn’t huge—just under a thousand kids. Their grade? Two hundred max. The odds weren’t impossible. "Benny didn’t say anything," he said carefully. Then, because Callie had once known him better than anyone: "You think it’s someone we know?"

A shaky exhale crackled through the speaker. "Jason’s been absent since Tuesday."

Jason. The name dropped into Tyler’s stomach like a lead weight. Jason Whittaker—six feet of lacrosse bro with a jawline that looked like it had been chiseled by someone who took their job *very* seriously. The guy who’d shoulder-checked Tyler in the hallway last year for "looking at Callie too long." The reason Tyler’s lunch period suddenly changed this year without explanation. Jason didn’t just dislike Callie having male friends—he treated them like trespassers on private property.

Tyler pressed the phone harder against his ear, the plastic warming his skin. "Tuesday?" He kept his voice deliberately flat, like he wasn’t mentally scrolling through every hallway encounter with Jason this week. "That’s… before Huntsville even hit the news."

But he hadn't actually seen Jason all week now that he thought about it. He didn't say that out loud though.

Callie made a small, strangled noise. "He texted me Monday night saying he felt 'off.'" The word dripped with irony—the kind you only earned after years of deciphering boy-speak. "Like, 'just a headache' off. Then nothing. His phone goes straight to voicemail now."

Jason caught The Bug?

The image hit Tyler like a punch to the gut—Jason Whittaker with softer features, long lashes framing widened eyes, that trademark cocky smirk replaced by something uncertain. His—her—broad shoulders tapered into a delicate collarbone, the letterman jacket hanging differently on a frame that no longer filled it out. Tyler's breath caught. Would she still strut through the halls like she owned them? Would her voice still drip with that same arrogant drawl, just higher pitched? The thought should've been satisfying. Instead, it left him queasy.

It scared him more than he thought.

A mental image of image of himself as a girl flashed through his head too.

Tyler’s fingers tightened around his phone, the plastic case creaking under his grip. Callie’s breath hitched through the speaker—a sound he hadn’t heard since they were kids hiding in her treehouse during a thunderstorm. "You still there?" she whispered.

Tyler swallowed hard, his throat suddenly dry. "Yeah," he managed, his voice rougher than he intended. The glow-in-the-dark star on his ceiling blurred slightly as he blinked.

He decided to distract her.

They talked about the new zombie game update—how the devs had messed up the loot drops again. About whether pineapple belonged on pizza (Callie was a firm yes, Tyler an emphatic no). About Mrs. Henderson’s painfully slow grading system, and how Tyler was still waiting on his last English essay score from three weeks ago. Anything but The Bug. Anything but Jason.

At some point, Callie’s voice lost that panicked edge, settling into the familiar rhythm of their childhood—easy, effortless, like slipping into well-worn sneakers. Tyler found himself grinning at her impression of Mr. Davies’ infamous “pop quiz face,” the one that always looked like he’d smelled something foul. She snorted mid-sentence, and the sound startled them both into silence before they burst out laughing.

He forgot her laugh. He missed her laugh.

The digital clock on his nightstand blinked from 9:59 to 10:00am, the numbers glowing neon blue in the dim room. Tyler realized with a start that they’d been talking for nearly two hours—two hours where the world outside his bedroom door ceased to exist. No Bug. No Kayla. No looming dread. Just Callie’s voice weaving through his thoughts like sunlight through tree branches.

He should have been in Biology class right now. It was all pretty surreal.

Tyler's phone buzzed against his ear—another call coming in. Benny's name flashed across the screen like a distress signal. He hesitated, thumb hovering over the ignore button. "Uh, Callie? Benny's calling. Probably freaking out."

The line crackled as Callie exhaled. "You should take it," she said, voice softer now—less like the girl who'd just been cackling over Mr. Davies’ eyebrows, more like someone remembering the world outside still existed. "Tell him... I don’t know. Tell him to stop licking doorknobs or whatever."

A SpongeBob reference. He smirked then laughed.

Then they hung up. He called Benny back immediately.

Benny picked up on the first ring. "Dude." His voice was all breathless urgency, like he'd just sprinted up five flights of stairs. "You will not believe—" A loud crash interrupted him, followed by Benny's muffled cursing.

Tyler heard what sounded like Benny tripping over his own gaming chair—again—before his friend’s voice came back, sharper this time. "Jason Whittaker’s Instagram just went private. And his profile pic? Gone. Like, blank silhouette gone."

He sighed. So it was true. Jason had It.

"So Cal was right" he sighed.

Benny's breath hitched through the phone. "Wait—Callie *knew*?" The shock in his voice was palpable. "Since when do you two talk?"

"She just called. She didn't know but she suspected" Tyler sighed, realizing how scared she must be.

Tyler's fingers dug into his mattress as Benny rambled about Jason’s sudden social media wipe—how his Snapchat score hadn’t budged in 48 hours, how the lacrosse team’s group chat had gone ominously quiet. None of it should’ve mattered. Jason was an asshole. But Tyler’s stomach twisted anyway.

Benny's next words came out in a hushed rush. "Dude, someone leaked a screenshot from Jason’s cousin’s private Snapchat story—there’s no way it’s him. This girl has, like, *butterfly clips* in her hair. And she’s wearing his letterman jacket."

Tyler's breath caught in his throat. Three days. Three fucking days. The CDC pamphlets said incubation took weeks—enough time for the fever to spike, for the body to ache, for the changes to creep in slow and inevitable like rust spreading under paint. Jason went MIA Monday night. Today was Thursday morning. There was no way.

"No way" Tyler was shaking his head even though Benny couldn't see him. "Its too early, someone is pranking"

There was a ping, telling him he got a message. Opening it up, he saw the image in question.

There she was, in all her glory.

Tyler’s thumb hovered over the image, the pixels burning into his retinas. The girl in the photo—Jason?—was angled away from the camera, her silhouette unmistakable in the oversized letterman jacket. Sunlight caught the delicate curve of her jawline, the way her lashes cast shadows on her cheeks. Butterfly clips held back strands of hair that looked softer than Tyler remembered, the color lighter, almost golden.

The photo blurred as Tyler's hand trembled. He zoomed in—there, just visible beneath the jacket's collar: the faintest hint of Jason's tattoo, the one he'd drunkenly bragged about getting last summer. A Spartan helmet, now stretched slightly across smoother skin. Tyler's stomach lurched. "Holy shit," he whispered.

That stupid tattoo. The school mascot.

Double shit.

"This has to be photoshopped" he said to no one in particular.

"She's cute" muttered Benny on the other end of the phone.

"SHE dunked your head in the toilet last year" he reminded his friend.

Tyler clicked off the image as Benny exhaled sharply. "Yeah, well, *she* can dunk my head wherever she wants now." The weak attempt at humor fell flat.

Tyler stared at the blank spot on his ceiling where the other glow-in-the-dark stars had fallen off years ago. His phone burned against his ear—Benny’s panicked breathing syncing with the pulse pounding in his own temples. The silence stretched like a rubber band about to snap.

"I need to see if Callie is all right" Tyler quickly said before ending the call with Benny.

Tyler didn't even bother texting Callie this time—he just called, pressing the phone to his ear with fingers that still felt vaguely numb. The line rang once. Twice. Three times. His pulse hammered against his ribs with each unanswered ring until—

Callie picked up on the fourth ring, her voice thick like she'd been crying. "Tyler?" The way she said his name—like she was clinging to it—made his chest tighten.

The sound of Callie's ragged breathing filled Tyler's ear, louder than the muffled pop music still pulsing through Kayla's bedroom wall. "You saw it too?" she whispered, voice cracking on the last word.

Tyler pressed the phone harder against his ear as if proximity could somehow bridge the sudden gulf between them. "Yeah," he said, voice low. The photo burned behind his eyelids—Jason’s sharp jawline softened, the arrogant tilt of his chin replaced by something uncertain. "Benny sent it to me. Look its probably just phot---"

"Its real" Callie cut him off. "His sister called and confirmed it"

Shit.

Tyler's fingers went slack around his phone. It slipped from his grip and thudded onto the mattress, Callie's tinny voice still spilling from the speaker—something about Jason's sister finding him curled up in the shower, shaking and feverish, his body changing before their eyes. The words blurred together like watercolors left in the rain.

Tyler scrambled for the phone, his fingers fumbling against the sheets. "Callie—wait, slow down." His pulse roared in his ears, drowning out Kayla’s music from down the hall. "How fast is this thing moving?"

The line crackled with static, or maybe it was just Callie's uneven breathing. "His sister said—" Her voice hitched. "She said it took hours, Tyler. Not days. Hours."

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF

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Author's Note: So I decided that this is technically the next week, seeing as I posted the last one on Saturday. I almost decided to wait until this Saturday but I felt the first chapter could good traction. Thanks to everyone for that by the way. This chapter progresses the story along, finally getting to the incident. I can also confirm that this is part 2 of 5. I spent some time yesterday breaking down the story into 5 parts. Some might be shorter or longer than the others but it works out in the end. I can also say that the second story I'm working on is going to be longer. Please don't forget to provide comments or feedback :D.
 

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2.

Shit, Jason was one of the fast ones then. It was all over the Internet. There were some like Jason who contracted the virus and changed quickly.

The silence between them stretched long enough that Tyler could hear the faint tremor in Callie's exhale—like she was holding herself together by sheer willpower. He pressed his palm flat against the bed, the comforter soft and relaxing. "Are you..." He swallowed hard, suddenly unsure what to ask. Are you scared? Are you safe?

"I'm good," she finally said. "Jason was in Seattle last weekend. Family reunion. I haven't seen him since Friday, the night before he left"

That was a relief at least.

His thoughts were interrupted by a text from Benny:

*Second Ridgewood victim is Tori Bishop*

The name "Tori Bishop" flashed on Tyler’s screen like a warning. His thumb hovered over Benny’s text, the letters blurring slightly as his pulse kicked up. Tori—varsity cheer captain, Kayla’s sometimes-friend, the girl who’d laughed when Jason shoulder-checked him last fall. Now she was Patient Zero at Ridgewood High.

Tyler’s fingers froze over his phone screen. Tori Bishop. The name ricocheted through his skull like a pinball. He'd seen her just yesterday in the hallway, tossing her ponytail over one shoulder as she whispered something that made Kayla snort-laugh into her locker. Now she was—what? Changing? Already changed? His stomach lurched at the mental image: Tori’s cheerleader-perfect frame molding into something harder, muscles, broad shoulders.

"Tori is the other one," he said softly to Callie.

The line went dead silent. Tyler could hear Callie’s shallow breaths—too controlled, like she was counting them. Then, barely audible: "Kayla was with Tori at lunch yesterday."

Tyler grunted. "She was in the hall with lots of us yesterday."

Was his sister ok? Was he ok? Was anyone ok?

"Cal, I'll call you later ok" he said and hung up before she could respond.

He spent a lot of time thinking about what any of this even meant. He sat in his room, alone with his thoughts for hours. If Tori was sick then half the school was by this point? His heart was pounding, everything was terrifying.

Before dinner, Benny called again.

"False alarm dude" he said, relieved. "Tori was just looking for clout. She was full of shit Got her expelled. Kicked off the squad. Her parents are pissed."

Tyler let out a shaky breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. The tension seeped out of his shoulders like air from a punctured tire. "Are you fucking serious?" His voice came out sharper than intended—half-relief, half-exasperation.

Tyler stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, pressing his fingertips against the smooth skin beneath his jawline. No fever. No swelling. Nothing. The rational part of his brain knew Tori’s false alarm changed nothing—the Bug was still real, Jason was proof—but his lungs expanded easier now, as if someone had loosened the vice around his ribs. He splashed cold water on his face just to feel something besides the lingering static in his nerves.

Tyler's fingers left damp streaks on his phone screen as he tapped out a message to Callie—*False alarm on Tori*—then hesitated before adding, *Benny says she was lying for attention.* The words looked flimsy even as he sent them, like a Band-Aid on a bullet wound. The bathroom light buzzed overhead, too bright, making his reflection look pale and washed-out. He rubbed at his cheekbone absently, half-expecting the skin to feel different under his fingertips.

The clatter of silverware against plates echoed louder than usual in the too-quiet kitchen. Tyler pushed his mashed potatoes into a sad little crater, watching the gravy pool in the center like a microscopic lake. Across the table, his mom stabbed at her chicken with mechanical precision, her fork tines scraping against ceramic with each bite. The absence of Kayla's dramatic sighs and their dad's terrible puns made the room feel cavernous—like they were two survivors at the end of the world, chewing through their last meal before the apocalypse.

"You okay?" His mom's voice cut through the silence, softer than the fluorescent lights humming above them. She didn't look up from her plate when she said it, as if asking the question to her green beans instead of him.

Tyler shrugged, then realized she wasn't watching. "Yeah. Just tired." The lie tasted bland on his tongue, same as the overcooked broccoli. He could've told her about Callie's panic, Benny's hysterical texts, Jason's... transformation. Instead, he watched a single pea roll off his fork and onto the tablecloth, where it left a tiny damp spot.

"Jason was on the news," his mother added.

Tyler’s fork clattered onto his plate. The sound was deafening in the silent kitchen. "What?" His voice cracked like he was thirteen again. His mother finally looked up, her eyebrows knitting together at his reaction.

Tyler's mother set her fork down with deliberate slowness, her eyes never leaving his face. "They interviewed his parents," she said, her voice unnervingly calm. "On Channel 4. About an hour ago." A pea rolled off her plate as she spoke, joining Tyler's abandoned one on the tablecloth like some bizarre vegetable solidarity movement.

The pea stared up at Tyler like a tiny green eye. His mother’s words hung between them—Jason Whittaker, once untouchable, now reduced to a news segment sandwiched between weather updates and a car commercial. Tyler’s fingers twitched toward his phone in his pocket. "What did they say?" he asked, aiming for casual and missing by a mile.

His mother's fingers tapped a nervous rhythm against her water glass. "They didn’t show him. Just—his parents talking about how fast it was. Hours. Hours to turn their son...They kept saying ‘he’ but..." Her voice trailed off, eyes darting to the stairs where Kayla’s music still thumped faintly.

Tyler instinctively grabbed his mother's shaking hands.

Tyler's mother squeezed his fingers so tight the knuckles popped. "They showed his—her—hands," she whispered. "Just for a second. The camera zoomed in while she was holding her mother's." Her thumbnail dug into Tyler's palm. "The nails were painted lavender. It was a good shade on her..."

"I'm not very hungry" Tyler finally admitted, then excused himself.

Back in his room, he decided to do some research on The Bug.

Tyler's laptop screen cast a sickly blue glow across his face as he scrolled through forums with names like BugWatch and TransitionTruth. The official CDC site offered sterile bullet points—fever, muscle aches, rapid but painless physiological changes—but the comment sections beneath each post told darker stories. Users named SurvivorGirl17 and FormerDudeNowCutie described phantom limb syndrome for lost masculinity, of waking up screaming when their new bodies didn't match muscle memory.

What he really wanted to know about were the rumored mental changes.

The screen flickered as Tyler clicked on a thread titled Personality Changes: Myth or Reality? His pulse hammered against his ribs as he skimmed through firsthand accounts—people claiming The Bug rewired their preferences overnight, altered their laughter patterns, even shifted their handwriting. One user insisted they'd gone from hating strawberries to craving them daily.

He ignored those. He wanted to know about the real, "scary" shifts.

Tyler’s fingers hovered over the keyboard, the cursor blinking mockingly on a thread titled "The Bug Doesn’t Just Change Your Body—It Changes Your Head Too". He started at the top and scrolled down.

The first post was from someone called NeuroShiftConfirmed—all caps, typos littering the text like breadcrumbs of panic. IT CHANGES HOW YOU THINK, it screamed. I USED TO HATE ROMCOMS NOW I CRY AT THE TRAILERS. MY FRIENDS SAY MY LAUGH SOUNDS DIFFERENT. I DONT FEEL LIKE ME.

Tyler’s breath fogged the screen as he leaned closer, scrolling past NeuroShiftConfirmed’s frantic posts. The next reply was calmer, clinical almost—a user named MedStudentMaybe dissecting reported cognitive changes with bullet points. "No evidence of altered core personality," they wrote. "But subtle shifts in emotional processing and sensory preferences are common. Think puberty 2.0—just faster and weirder."

It was the third user that drew his interest the most, one called GirlyGirl.

The username GirlyGirl glowed ominously on the screen. Tyler’s throat tightened as he read her post:

GirlyGirl's post was timestamped three days ago—just before Jason vanished. "It’s like someone flipped a switch in my brain," she’d written. "One minute I’m arguing about football stats with my brother, the next I’m crying because the way sunlight hit my bedroom wall was ‘too pretty.’ My mom says I even walk different now—less slouch, more hips. And the weirdest part? It doesn’t feel wrong. It feels like I was always supposed to be this way."

She described more quirky things.

The screen blurred as Tyler scrolled further down GirlyGirl’s post history—each entry is a timestamped fracture in someone’s identity. A month ago, her profile pic---BassRat--- had been a blurry shot of a bass guitar propped against a skateboard. Now it was a close-up of glossy lips blowing a bubblegum bubble, filter-drenched and unapologetically pink.

Her earliest posts read like any other teenage boy—grumbling about gym class, bragging about beating Dark Souls without healing. Then, sandwiched between memes about The Bug and a rant about his—her?—mom’s cooking, the shift began.

Day 1 post-fever read the timestamp. "Woke up craving strawberry ice cream??? I hate sweet shit wtf." The next entry, six days later: "Why does my hoodie feel scratchy now. Everything feels wrong." 2 weeks later, GirlyGirl was posting selfies with the caption "Why do I kind of slay with my hair like this??"—the strands tousled in a way that looked accidental but Tyler suspected was painfully deliberate.

She was pretty, real pretty and she was wearing a pink top so tight her new boobs were practically spilling out of it.

Tyler's fingers hovered over the image, zooming in on the transformation—the softened jawline, the way her collarbones now dipped into delicate hollows where muscle used to bulge. The pink crop top clung to curves that definitely hadn’t been there in her profile’s older skate park pics. Her caption—"Guess who finally filled out her favorite new top "—had 4K likes and counting.

Her bio had changed too. Formerly a BassRat. Now I'm Bugged & Loving It , followed by a rainbow emoji and a link to her new TikTok. Tyler clicked without thinking. The first video loaded—GirlyGirl twirling in slow motion, her skirt flaring as she blew a kiss to the camera. "POV: You wake up hotter than your bully," the text overlay read. The comments were a minefield of thirst traps and horror—"Wife material" sandwiched between "This is dystopian".

Tyler felt sick to his stomach.

The room spun—or maybe that was just his head. He pressed his palms against his closed eyelids until neon shapes bloomed in the darkness, trying to erase the image of GirlyGirl’s smug wink.

The laptop screen dimmed to black as Tyler slammed it shut harder than intended. His breath came too fast, nostrils flaring against the stale air of his bedroom. Outside, Kayla’s music had finally stopped—replaced by the rhythmic thump of her doing god-knows-what against their shared wall. Probably some TikTok dance. The normalcy of it grated against his nerves like sandpaper.

He went to bed that night with too many jumbled thoughts.

Tyler woke with the taste of stale panic still clinging to his tongue. He kicked off the sweat-damp sheets, his bare feet hitting the carpet with a thud that felt too loud in the heavy silence. The house hummed with the kind of quiet that made his skin itch. He needed air. Now.

His Mom was in the kitchen, eyes glued to the screen.

The news report finally talked about the second *real* Ridgewood victim. It was some girl named Beth he didn't know. A freshman.

"Mom, I'm climbing the walls" he groaned, hoodie already on, sneakers in hand. "I need to take a walk"

"Your sister hasn't gotten out of bed yet" she muttered, still staring at the TV. A mug of untouched coffee sat in front of her, gone cold. Tyler hesitated—something about her posture, the rigid way her fingers gripped the counter’s edge—made him pause.

"Have you slept?" he asked, concerned.

She ignored the question. "Don't go too far and keep your phone on at all times"

Tyler hesitated, then pulled her into a quick, tight hug. She smelled like stale coffee and stress-sweat. When he pulled back, she didn't meet his eyes—just nodded toward the door.

This new normal was starting to terrify him.

The morning air hit Tyler like a slap—too crisp, too bright. He found himself walking in the direction toward Callie's house, he wasn't sure why.

Tyler’s sneakers scuffed against cracked pavement as he turned onto Maple Street, the rhythmic crunch of gravel the only sound in the unnatural quiet. Normally, this stretch buzzed with morning joggers and dog walkers—now it felt like a ghost town. He pulled his hoodie tighter around himself, suddenly hyperaware of the empty swings creaking in the playground to his left.

Was the virus really scaring everyone like this?

It was one thing for teenagers to run scared but everyone else?

He shook his head. It was kind of silly. After all, only teenagers were affected. Not only that, adults and children couldn't even carry the virus. So all this sheltering in place nonsense was unnecessary.

Tyler rounded the corner onto Callie’s street just as the first raindrops splattered against his forehead. The sky had been clear ten minutes ago—now it hung low and bruise-purple, like the weather couldn’t make up its mind either. He picked up his pace, passing identical ranch houses with drawn blinds, until Callie’s came into view—the one with the chipped blue mailbox and the sagging porch swing where they’d shared their first (and last) awkward kiss in seventh grade.

Callie Marshall, the Girl Who Got Away.

They were never an official couple but he was lying if he said he didn't want it. He was certain she wanted it too. But he was too much of a coward to act on his feelings and Jason swooped in before he knew it. Then all he could do was standby and watch as the Asshat controlled her life. It really pissed him off but the Whitakers were town "royalty". Jason's Mom was the Mayor, his Dad owned a real estate empire. Jason was raised with the belief that what he wanted, he got.

Tyler lost Callie even before the "fight" began.

Tyler's fist hovered an inch from Callie’s front door, knuckles tingling with indecision. The rain had escalated from a drizzle to torrential downpour in the time it took him to cross her yard. Water dripped from his hoodie strings as he inhaled sharply and gently knocked.

When the door finally opened, Callie's Mom was standing there.

"Tyler?" she asked, surprised. She was stunned for a moment until she took in his dripping wet form. "You're drenched. Get inside before you catch a cold"

He nodded as she stepped aside to let him in. "Hi Mrs. M" he said with a smile.

The familiar scent of cinnamon and laundry detergent hit Tyler as he stepped inside, his sneakers squeaking on the hardwood. Mrs. Marshall's eyes darted past him toward the empty street, her fingers tightening around the doorframe. "Callie's upstairs," she said, voice too bright. "She hasn't been sleeping well." The unspoken *since Jason* hung between them like a cobweb.

Tyler wiped his shoes extra carefully on the mat—a habit drilled into him after years of visiting the Marshalls' immaculate home. The embroidered tigers snarling up at him from the doormat were a gift from Callie’s halmeoni, according to Mrs. Marshall, who always pronounced the Korean word for grandmother with deliberate care, like she was balancing a precious heirloom on her tongue.

From the kitchen, the rhythmic chop-chop of a knife against wood echoed. Mr. Marshall stood at the counter, sleeves rolled up to reveal the faded ink of his old Marine tattoo as he julienned scallions with military precision. The air smelled like roasting garlic and the faintest hint of gochujang—a scent Tyler had come to associate with comfort until today, when it just reminded him how many meals Callie had shared with Jason while he lurked awkwardly at the periphery.

The creak of the stairs made Tyler look up just as Callie rounded the landing—barefoot, her toenails painted a chipped lavender that matched Jason's in the leaked photo. She wore an oversized Ridgewood High hoodie that Tyler recognized as Jason's, the sleeves swallowing her hands whole. Her hair—usually sleek and straight—tumbled in messy waves around her face, like she'd been running fingers through it for hours.

Mrs. Marshall pressed a mug into Tyler's hands—hot chocolate with mini marshmallows, his favorite since sixth grade—just as Callie froze mid-step. Her eyes locked onto Tyler with a rawness that made his pulse stutter. The hoodie's drawstrings swayed as she inhaled sharply, her knuckles whitening around the banister.

"You're here" she finally said.

He shrugged. "My feet brought me"

The silence stretched between them like a rubber band pulled too tight. Callie's fingers twitched against the banister, and Tyler found himself staring at the chipped lavender polish on her toes—same shade as Jason's now-delicate hands from the TV last night. The thought lodged in his throat like a fishbone.

"Why don't the two of you talk in the den" her mother suggested.

Callie's fingers twisted the hoodie drawstrings into tight spirals as she led Tyler into the den—the same room where they'd built pillow forts in elementary school and played spin-the-bottle in middle school. The familiarity of the space made the tension worse somehow, like seeing your childhood bedroom painted black. She perched on the edge of the sofa, knees pulled up under Jason's hoodie, while Tyler hovered near the bookshelf.

The den smelled like old paper and the vanilla-scented candle Callie always burned when she studied. Tyler traced the spine of a well-worn Harry Potter book—the one they'd read aloud to each other during the summer before eighth grade, voices cracking with laughter when they messed up the British accents.

"How are you holding up?" he asked after a long silence.

Callie’s fingers trembled as she pulled her phone from the pocket of Jason’s oversized hoodie. The screen flickered to life, casting a pale glow across her face. "I wasn’t going to show anyone," she whispered, voice cracking. "But it’s you. It’s always been you."

Tyler’s breath hitched as she turned the phone toward him. The image was crystal clear—no leaked Snapchat blur, no pixelated distortion. Just Jason Whittaker, transformed.

The girl he saw was drop dead gorgeous. She looked like she could be Jason's twin sister, if he had one.

Jason's face filled the screen—same sharp cheekbones but softened now, the angles rounded into something delicate. Her lips were glossy pink, slightly parted like she'd been caught mid-laugh, and her eyebrows—once thick and unruly—had been reshaped into perfect arches. The photo was casual, just a selfie taken in what looked like a bedroom, but everything about her screamed girl. Her hair fell in loose caramel waves over one shoulder, longer than Tyler remembered, with golden highlights that looked professionally done. A silver heart pendant rested in the hollow of her throat, drawing attention to collarbones that seemed more pronounced now, elegant.

She wore a cropped white tank top that showed off smooth, toned shoulders and—Tyler's stomach lurched—the unmistakable swell of breasts pressing against the fabric. The school mascot was tattooed there, the same one Jason had on his pec.. Her hands rested under her chin, fingers tipped with pearly nails that matched the lavender polish from the TV. The pose was effortlessly feminine, one knee drawn up to her chest, the curve of her thigh visible beneath denim shorts that looked painted on.

This was only after a few days. Tyler shuddered, thinking about GirlyGirl's posts from last night.

Shit.

Callie stuffed the phone back into the hoodie. "She calls herself Jasmine now. She called last night. We talked. Then she..." Callie was tearing up now.

Tyler instinctively pulled her into a hug. She cried with her head on his shoulder. It felt like old times but it didn't make things any easier.

When she finally stopped a few minutes later, she pulled away slightly, wiping her eyes. "Ty, I don't know if I can do this" She sniffled. "When I talked to hi–her, it was like a whole new person. She was bubbly and chatty and so damn nice I wanted to scream. Even when she broke up with me because 'duh, not a lesbo', I wasn't angry, I mourned the loss of my boyfriend."

‘Let's be honest,’ he thought but didn't dare say it, ‘it sounds like an improvement.’

"Shit, that's..." he started, but wasn't sure how to finish.

"Shitty," she finished for him. "This Bug is disgusting and scary and..." She sighed. "Messed up."

"Messed up?" he asked, confused.

"She's hot," Callie finally admitted. "I mean you..."

He did know. He was one of only a few people who did. Callie had confessed to him in 6th grade that she liked girls too. Not even her parents knew. It was also one of the key reasons he never asked her to be his girlfriend. It didn't weird him out but she was one of his best friends and he wanted her to find her own path. He just never thought it would lead her to Jason.

Callie laughed. "It’s also ironically stupid," She ran her fingers through her hair.

"What do you mean?"

Callie bit her lip. "Jason was gay. I was his beard."

Tyler blinked. The words hung between them like a bad punchline—Jason was gay. I was his beard. Rain lashed against the den windows as Tyler’s brain stuttered through the implications. Callie’s fingers twisted Jason’s—no, Jasmine’s—hoodie strings into knots.

"He came out to me over the summer before we dated," she whispered. "His parents would’ve lost their shit. Mayor Whittaker’s kid? In Ridgewood?" Her laugh was hollow. "So we faked it. And then the Bug made him into a girl who likes boys. The universe has a fucked up sense of humor."

Tyler stared at Callie, his mouth slightly open like a fish gulping air. The rain outside hammered against the windows in erratic bursts, matching the staccato rhythm of his thoughts. "So you two were never..." He gestured vaguely between them, unable to finish the sentence.

She shook her head. "I liked him a lot. Not at first, but he grew on me." She twisted the pull strings. "He's not an ass. That was all a tough guy macho act. He was actually really sweet. Even though we weren't real, he treated me like we were." She sighed again. "I fooled myself into thinking—"

Her train of thought stopped mid-sentence. She let out a puff of air and lowered her head. He rubbed her shoulder in an attempt to comfort her. Inside, his mind was a mess. Jason was gay and it wasn't a real relationship. All this time he could have...

"If it was fake, why was he so possessive?" he finally asked.

She shrugged. "Maybe some small part of him liked being a dick. I won't even pretend to understand some of his reasons."

Fair enough.

A moment after that, Mrs. Marshall came into the room. "Tyler, your mother called. Figured you might be here. She's worried. I think she wants you back home"

He left Callie's after that, but not before giving her a hug and promising to call later. The rain had stopped, thankfully, but the walk home still felt cold. He couldn't help but think of all the time he wasted not being more open with Callie. He felt robbed–not by her but by Jason. He knew it was selfish and stupid but a small part of him hated Jason even more now.

When he finally got back home, his mother hugged him tightly.

Back in his room, he texted Benny:

Went to Callie's. She showed me a pic of the new Jason.

Benny: And?

Tyler: Its some scary shit, dude

Benny: I don't care about that man. I wanna know if she's really hot. Last image was too blurry to tell for sure?

He groaned and didn't reply.

Things stayed pretty quiet on Friday. He spent most of his free time in his room gaming. Kayla spent most of her time sulking. Outside of gaming, the only other socializing was with Benny and Callie. Mostly through texts. It was nice to reconnect with Callie again, it sucked that something as horrible as The Bug had brought them back together, though. Talking to her was like old times.

By the time Saturday came around, he was practically crawling up the walls again.

He finally ventured out of his room to find Kayla in the living room, on the couch in sweats. When not trying to impress people, she was kind of a slob.

"Look who lives," he joked as he dropped onto the other end of the couch.

"Bite me," she snapped, without taking her eyes off some trashy reality show she was watching.

"Not sure I want to take the risk," he snarked back.

She gave him the finger. That was their relationship in a nutshell.

"So Jason was streaming last night," Kayla finally said, still not looking away from the TV. "Well, Jasmine, I suppose."

Since when did Jason Whittaker have any interest in streaming?

"You're serious?" he asked, she nodded. "That's crazy"

"It was kind of surreal, you know?" Kayla laughed. "Jason was an ass and Jasmine is...well, let's say she won't be winning a Nobel Prize.”

That scared the hell out of him. Jason might have been an ass but he was smart. One of the smarter guys in their year, actually.

Tyler pulled out his phone and googled it. It didn't take him long to find her stream.

The screen loaded with a burst of pastel pink and twinkling fairy lights. Jasmine—formerly Jason—sat cross-legged on what looked like a frilly bedspread, her caramel waves pinned back by those butterfly hairpins. She was mid-laugh at something off-camera, her glossy lips parting to reveal perfectly-aligned teeth. Her new larger assets bounced up and down as she laughed, barely concealed in a pink tank top.

Tyler was speechless. This was Jason Whittaker, former terror.

"OMG, you guyssss," Jasmine squealed, her voice several octaves higher than Tyler remembered. "I totes love the support. You're the best!" She clapped her hands together, her pearly pink nails glinting under the ring light. The chat scrolled furiously to her right, a blur of heart emojis and thirsty comments.

He read a lot of them. Most of it was trash, but some of it was from classmates who all seemed shocked at the transformation.

Jasmine pouted at the screen, tilting her head. "Nooo, I'm not taking requests for outfit changes. Perverts." She giggled, batting her eyelashes. "Unless you're cute. Then maybe." She winked.

Tyler shut off his phone, feeling queasy.

"Twilight Zone, am I right?" asked Kayla, who had been watching over his shoulder. "He asked me out once but I passed. I'm no one's beard.”

Tyler was shocked. "You knew?"

Kayla laughed. "Everyone knew. That boy was too put together".

Tyler wasn't sure what to say. When he finally spoke, his voice was low. "This virus is terrifying".

Kayla said nothing.

Tyler went back to his room and gamed until lunch, trying to distract himself again.

An hour later, Benny texted: Sierra Clark is throwing a big party tonight.

Tyler texted back: You're kidding?

Benny: She's calling it The Bug Bash.

Tyler groaned. Only Sierra would do something this stupid and reckless.

Benny: I'm thinking of going.

Tyler responded quickly: I'm thinking of having you committed.

Benny responded with an emoji giving him the finger.

Tyler sighed and tossed his phone on the bed. This was getting way out of hand.

The doorknob rattled at 10:47 PM—not the tentative twist of someone checking in, but the jerky panic of a mother who'd just found an empty bed where her daughter should be. Tyler barely had time to yank his earbuds out before his door burst open, revealing his mother silhouetted in the hallway light. One hand clutched her phone like it might dissolve. "Kayla's gone," she said, her voice stripped raw.

Shit.

Tyler scrambled upright as she thrust her phone at him. The screen displayed Kayla's hastily typed text: Gone to Sierra's. Don't wait up. Below it, a grainy Snapchat screenshot: Kayla grinning in Sierra's vanity mirror, her reflection haloed by neon party lights, and a red plastic cup dangling from her fingers. The timestamp read 9:22 PM.

Fucking Kayla.

"I need you to go and drag her back," his mother demanded.

Crap. Kayla so owed him.

Tyler’s sneakers hit the pavement hard as he jogged toward Sierra’s neighborhood, his hoodie flapping against his ribs in the humid night air. Ridgewood’s streets were unnervingly empty for a Saturday—no groups of kids loitering near the 7-Eleven and no cars cruising with windows down. There was only the occasional flicker of a TV through half-drawn blinds and blue light catching on the Bug-awareness flyers plastered to every telephone pole.

Sierra Clark’s house loomed like a wedding cake left out in the rain—three tiers of beige stucco and faux-stone accents, crowned with gaudy wrought-iron balconies that no one ever used. Tyler slowed to a walk as he turned onto her street, his lungs burning from the jog. Every driveway here was a mini car show—gleaming SUVs with dealer plates still on, one stupidly oversized pickup with tires taller than Kayla. The Whittakers might’ve been Ridgewood royalty, but the Clarks had bought their way into court.

He approached the front door, not expecting to get in. As soon as he rang the doorbell, the door was opened. Some girl he barely knew invited him in.

The bass hit Tyler like a physical shove as he stepped inside, the air thick with the cloying sweetness of cheap vodka and body spray. Sierra’s marble foyer had been transformed into a makeshift coat graveyard—puffer jackets and letterman’s sleeves tangled together in a heap, one stray Converse dangling from the chandelier. Someone had taped a laminated CDC warning about The Bug to the mirror, but it was already defaced with Sharpie mustaches and crude doodles of bugs with boobs.

He squeezed past a grinding couple in the hallway, their laughter drowned by the remix blasting from the living room. The kitchen was worse: a sweating jungle of red cups and sticky countertops, where a shirtless sophomore Tyler vaguely recognized from gym class was doing a keg stand to raucous cheers. A cluster of girls by the fridge squealed as he sprayed foam everywhere, their manicured hands clutching their phones like talismans. One of them—Lindsay Cho, maybe?—had glittery butterfly clips in her hair. The kind Jasmine wore in her stream.

He couldn’t find his sister though. There were too many people, too many bodies.

Finally, he grabbed the shoulder of some kid who shared Math with both him. "You seen my sister?" he asked loudly, trying to get him to hear him over the music.

"Basement," the kid shouted back and pointed toward a door.

The basement stairs groaned under Tyler’s weight, each step swallowing him deeper into a pulsing cave of neon and bass. Strobe lights sliced through the haze of vape smoke, catching the sweat-slick faces of dancers in freeze-frame glimpses—a girl tossing her hair, a guy wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, and someone’s abandoned phone glowing on the carpet. The air smelled like spilled Mike’s Hard and that cheap vanilla body spray Kayla used to douse herself in before dates.

He squinted, trying to find his sister in the mass of bodies, but there was no such luck.

Annoyed, he pushed his way in. There were so many people bouncing and undulating to the music, it was like an orgy.

Tyler caught a flash of Kayla’s neon pink headband near the makeshift DJ booth and lunged forward—only for fingers to clamp around his wrist like a handcuff. The girl yanked him backward, his sneakers skidding on sticky basement tiles, and before he could process the whirl of glitter and perfume, her mouth crashed into his.

It was shocking, confusing, and–most of all–dangerous. He thought he saw a face, but couldn't be sure. He thought he saw butterflies, but it could have been a trick of a light. He definitely heard her whisper in his ear after the kiss, though.

"You're going to be so beautiful," she said seductively then she was done.

Wait, what?!

He quickly wiped his mouth, horrified.

Tyler stumbled back, his lips tingling from the stranger's kiss—no, not just tingling. Burning. He wiped his mouth again with the back of his hand, heart hammering against his ribs. The basement lights strobed, catching glimpses of grinning faces that didn’t seem to notice what had just happened. His wrist still pulsed where she’d grabbed him. "Who the hell—" he started, but the crowd had already swallowed her whole.

Tyler's fingers flew to his lips, rubbing them raw as if he could scrub away the phantom pressure of that kiss. His skin prickled with something worse than panic—an invasive warmth spreading from his mouth down his throat, like swallowing sunlight. The music throbbed around him, suddenly distorted, the bass notes punching his eardrums in slow motion.

*****

She saw him in the crowd. Her brother. For a moment, she thought she was seeing things. There was no way a dweeb like him would be here. Then she saw him stagger. She saw some girl disappear into the mosh, leaving Tyler alone. She was pissed. Mom sent him. The little nark. She was going to kick his ass so hard.

A moment later, Kayla was at his side.

"Ty, what the fuck?!" she said, grabbing his shoulder. "Did Mom send–?" As soon as she touched him, she knew something was wrong.

"She kissed me," he gasped, touching his lips.

"What?" asked Kayla, looking around. "Who kissed you?"

"Some girl… she… shit, Kay," he stammered.

Kayla stared at her brother. She was about to make some comment, some remark until she saw it. The look. There was pure terror in his eyes. Whatever animosity she had for him was gone in an instant. She snapped around, angry. Her heart was hammering in her chest. She looked around, frantic. Tyler was next to her, shaking. She snapped back around, he looked at her in a dazed stupor.

‘No, no, no.’

She took him by the arm and dragged him toward the stairs.

‘Shit. Double shit. Triple Shit.’

She dragged him up the stairs. Someone shouted her name, but she ignored them.

‘Mom is going to kill me.’

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF

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Author's Note:Another week, another part. Here we are at part 3 of 5. I mentioned last time how some chapters might be longer than others, well this is one of them. It seemed to work out that way when I broke this up into 5 parts. I really like this part, I hope everyone else does too. I appreciate any kind of feedback or comments that people might have :).
 

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3.

Tyler woke in bed, his tongue thick and sour like he'd licked a battery. The ceiling fan spun lazy circles above him, its rhythmic click-click-click the only sound in the room. He tried to sit up—and immediately regretted it. His head pounded in time with the fan, a dull ache radiating from his temples down to his jaw. "Fuck," he muttered, rubbing his face.

His fingers twitched against the sheets, the fabric damp with cold sweat. The last thing he remembered was Kayla dragging him through Sierra's pulsing basement, the world tilting like a carnival ride gone wrong. Now his bedroom walls swam in and out of focus, the Avengers poster above his dresser warping into a blur of primary colors. He swallowed—his throat felt lined with sandpaper.

Something flashed into his mind.

A girl.

A kiss.

He absently touched his lips, almost as if he could still feel her lips there.

Tyler groaned as he rolled onto his side, his entire body protesting. Every muscle ached like he'd run a marathon—or gotten hit by a truck. His skin burned one moment and prickled with goosebumps the next. The back of his throat felt raw, like he'd swallowed a cheese grater. He squinted at his phone on the nightstand; the bright screen seared his retinas. 8:17 AM. The party was last night.

Shit. What happened? He couldn't remember a damn thing.

He tried sitting up again and again, his body protested.

He fumbled toward his phone, taking it off the nightstand.

There were several missed calls and texts from both Benny and Callie.  They grew from calm to desperate to scared very fast.

There was a gentle knock on his room door and a moment later, his mother came in. She looked scared and something else he couldn't quite place.

"What happened?" he asked, his voice strained.

His mother hesitated in the doorway. The morning light cut across her face, revealing dark circles under her eyes. "You don't remember?" Her voice was too controlled, the way it got when she was trying not to scream at Kayla.

"Bits and pieces" he said, trying to remember. "Went to the party. Thought I saw Kayla in the basement. Then some girl..." He stopped, touching his lips.

His mother was clutching her hands. "I called the doctor. They want to run some tests..."

Tests? "What for?" he asked, not willing to think of the correct answer.

That's when he noticed his mother had clearly been crying.

Realization was slowly dawning. She suspected. Tyler saw it in the way his mother's fingers tightened around the door handle, white-knuckled. In the forced calm of her breathing. In how her eyes kept darting to his neck, his wrists—any exposed skin—like she was tracking the spread of some invisible stain. His stomach lurched. "Mom," he croaked, "just say it."

His mother’s breath hitched—just once—before she stepped fully into the room and shut the door behind her with unnatural care.

The silence between them stretched like a live wire. Tyler watched his mother's throat work as she swallowed—too many times, too deliberately. Her fingers twitched toward his nightstand drawer, where she'd stashed the thermometer last winter. But she didn't move. Just stood there, breathing through her nose like a bull about to charge.

"You think...?" He couldn't bring himself to say it.

His mother clearly couldn't either. "The doctor will know."

Shit.

He felt sick to his stomach. This couldn't be happening.

Something dawned on him a second later. "What about Kayla?"

"Grounded for eternity" his mother said coldly.

He shook his head. "No, not that. Is she ok? Did she...?"

His mother sighed. "I love that about you honey. Your sister did something unthinkably stupid and you're concerned about her well being" His mother rubbed her temples. "She's fine. No fever. She's just the dumbest person on the planet"

Tyler reached for the glass of water on his nightstand, his fingers trembling against the condensation. The coolness should have been comforting, but his skin felt wrong—too sensitive, like someone had peeled back a layer. He took a sip and winced; even the water tasted different, metallic and thick. His mother was still hovering by the door, her arms crossed so tight her elbows were turning white.

"I'll let you get some rest and call the doctor to see when I can get you in," his mother said, before leaving the room.

He drifted off for a while.

A gentle knock on his door woke him up. He didn't even remember falling asleep but as soon as his eyes were open, he felt like someone had hit him with a truck.

The door opened and his mother came in with two people behind her---a man and a woman---both dressed in white coats with badges hanging from their necks.

He recognized the older man as Dr. Harris, the same doctor his family had been seeing for years. The woman was younger, more crisp and put together.

"Tyler," his mother said softly, "Dr. Harris and Dr. Jones are here to see you."

Dr. Jones stepped forward, her hands in her pockets, her eyes scanning him as if she were studying him under a microscope. "We didn't want you to have to leave the house," she said smoothly. "CDC protocol."

CDC.

"So it's..." he asked, swallowing hard, his head hurting. "Are you sure?"

Dr. Harris sighed, adjusting his glasses. "We can't be sure yet. But given the circumstances..." He glanced at Dr. Jones, who gave a subtle nod. "We'd like to run some preliminary tests. Just to rule things out."

Dr. Jones unzipped her medical kit with a sharp, plastic sound that made Tyler flinch. The contents gleamed under his bedroom light—needles in sterile packaging, vials with purple caps, alcohol swabs that smelled like chemical lemons. She snapped on gloves with practiced efficiency, the latex stretching tight over her fingers. "This will just pinch for a second," she said, but her tone was detached, like she'd said it a thousand times this week alone.

Tyler watched the needle sink into his arm with morbid fascination. His blood flowed darker than he expected, sluggish as syrup, filling the vial in thick pulses. Dr. Jones didn't react when he hissed—just swapped the first vial for a second, then a third. The room tilted slightly; he hadn't realized he'd been holding his breath until spots danced at the edges of his vision.

Dr. Harris patted his shoulder. "You're a good, strong boy, Tyler".

The way he said "boy" though with a slight pause almost, it was quite telling.

"How long will it take to be certain?" asked his mother as Dr. Jones stored the samples.

She smiled. "Once upon a time ago, it would take hours. I brought a mobile lab, it should only be a few minutes"

The amazement of modern medicine, thought Tyler, as both doctors left the room.

It was the longest few minutes of his life.

When Dr. Jones returned alone, he knew. He saw it in the way she looked at him.

Dr. Jones didn't speak at first. She just stood there with the tablet in her hands, her polished nails tapping against the screen in a rhythm that matched Tyler's rabbit-quick pulse. The silence stretched until his mother made a small, wounded noise—the kind someone makes when they already know the answer but need to hear it anyway.

The tablet screen flickered as Dr. Jones turned it toward them. A graph pulsed in jagged red lines, but Tyler barely registered it before she spoke. "Positive for Strain Gamma," she said, clinical and precise. "Viral load suggests exposure approximately..." She glanced at her watch. "Nine hours ago."

The Bug.

The tablet's glow painted Dr. Jones' face in cold blue as she recited statistics—viral mutation rates, cytokine markers—but Tyler barely heard her. His fingers crept up to his collarbone, pressing into the hollow where his pulse jumped. His skin felt fever-slick. Different.

"What exactly is Strain Gamma?" asked his very confused mother.

"The fast one" said the doctor in her detached way of speaking.

Dr. Jones' tablet clicked shut with finality. Tyler's mother pressed a hand to her mouth, her wedding band glinting under the harsh bedroom light. "Fast?" she echoed, voice cracking.

"Within 48 hours" Dr. Jones said with certainty.

His mother covered her mouth, trembling.

Tyler felt sick but he tried to remain calm. "What about my sister?"

Dr. Jones shook her head. "There are a few things we leave out of the press. One of them pertains to the various strains of the virus. Strain Gamma is not an airborne variant,” She paused for a moment as if considering her words. “In fact only 0.000001% of the strains are. It is one of the faster variants though, little fuss or muss"

The silence in Tyler's bedroom thickened like drying cement. Dr. Jones' tablet screen dimmed automatically, plunging them into the pale morning light filtering through his half-drawn blinds. Tyler stared at his hands—still his hands, still boy-hands—turning them over as if expecting to see cracks forming in his skin.

Dr. Jones shook her head. "It doesn't quite work that way. Most of the changes will happen while you sleep".

He sighed. That was good at least.

Dr. Jones turned to his mother. "Let's give your daughter some rest now, there are a few things we need to discuss".

Dr. Jones and his mother left.

Daughter.

Hearing it made him flinch. He was a daughter now.

He started to tremble but managed to get his phone. He took a deep breath and called the only person he wanted to tell: Callie.

The phone rang three times before Callie's breathless "Tyler?" punched through the speaker. There was a muffled clatter—books hitting the floor, probably—and the squeak of her bedroom door slamming shut. "Holy shit, I've been texting you since—"

"I was at a party last night. Sierra's. Kayla ran off and..." He took a deep breath. "Some random girl kissed me in the dark"

Callie’s gasp crackled through the phone. "Jesus Christ, Tyler—"

The phone slipped slightly in Tyler's sweaty palm. "Callie, it's—" His voice cracked. He cleared his throat and tried again. "The doctors just left. I tested positive. Strain Gamma."

The silence on the other end of the line stretched so long Tyler thought the call had dropped. Then came a sharp inhale, followed by the rustling of fabric as Callie shifted positions. "Gamma," she repeated, voice low and urgent. "That's the one Jasmine had."

He thought it might be.

The phone line hummed with static, or maybe it was the blood rushing in Tyler’s ears. Callie’s breathing hitched—once, twice—before she spoke again. "Okay," she said, too evenly. "Okay. Are you... feeling anything yet?"

"Just sick. Like flu sick" he groaned.

Tyler’s phone buzzed against his ear—Callie texting him a screenshot mid-call. He pulled the phone away, squinting at the image: a blurry selfie of Jasmine from earlier that morning, her lips glossy and parted in a mock pout. The caption read *Day 3 of being a gurl!!!* with a string of heart emojis. His stomach twisted. "She looks..."

Callie sighed. "I've been doing research. About the mental reconditioning"

Tyler stared at Jasmine's photo until his vision blurred. The girl in the picture bore no resemblance to the Jason he'd known—sharp-eyed and sarcastic, always three steps ahead in debate club. This version giggled behind a manicured hand, her lashes fluttering like trapped butterflies. "Mental reconditioning?" he echoed hoarsely.

"It varies from person to person. Some get the extreme like Jason and others get very little" said Callie, sending him another picture.

Another girl.

"Carla Smith from Atlanta. She was a track and field star before the change" Callie said "and one after it as well. No mental changes, other than some subtle nudges"

The second image was a candid shot—Carla running in a track meet. She looked like a normal girl.

She looks slow, Taylor waywardly thought.

"It's about having a strong constitution," Callie clarified. She took a deep breath. "You're strong Tyler. Stronger than Jason. If anyone can..."

He smiled. "Thanks Callie"

Tyler's fingers tightened around his phone. The screen flickered—low battery warning—but he barely noticed. Callie's voice had gone quiet, the weight of unspoken fears pressing between them. He opened his mouth to ask how long Carla had lasted before the changes started, but his bedroom door creaked open again.

His mother stood in the doorway.

"I gotta go Cal, I'll call you later?" he said, noticing the urgency in his mother's look.

The door clicked shut behind his mother with unnatural finality. She held a steaming mug—chamomile, probably, the kind she swore by for nerves—but her hands shook so badly the liquid sloshed dangerously close to the rim. "Tyler," she started, then stopped. Her gaze darted to his phone before snapping back to his face like she was afraid it might bite him. "Who were you—?"

"Just Callie, Mom" he said after hanging up and setting the phone down.

His mother set the mug on his nightstand without a sound, her fingers lingering on the ceramic like she was afraid it might shatter. The steam curled between them, carrying the scent of over-steeped chamomile and something medicinal beneath—valerian root, maybe, the stuff she’d started taking after Dad started traveling for work. She perched on the edge of his bed, the mattress dipping under her weight, but her posture stayed rigid, shoulders squared like she was bracing for impact.

"They’re sending a kit," she said finally, picking at a loose thread on his duvet. "Special vitamins. Electrolyte packets. Some... other things." Her voice hitched on the last word, eyes darting to his chest—just for a fraction of a second—before snapping back to his face. Tyler didn’t need to ask what "other things" meant. The way her fingers twitched toward her own collarbone told him everything.

He swallowed against the sudden tightness in his throat. "How bad is it gonna be?"

His mother’s breath shuddered out in a rush. She reached for his hand, then seemed to think better of it, her fingers curling into a fist on her knee instead. "Dr. Jones says Gamma moves in stages." Her thumb rubbed circles into her palm, a nervous tic he hadn’t seen since Kayla’s appendectomy. "First the fever breaks, then... the reshaping starts." The clinical term sounded grotesque in her mouth, like she’d practiced it in the mirror and still couldn’t make it fit.

"They... they have protocols for this now," she said carefully, her gaze fixed on her own twisting hands. "Once the transformation stabilizes—" The word caught in her throat. She cleared it and tried again. "Once you're through the worst of it, there's a streamlined process. New birth certificate, school records, everything."

Tyler watched his mother's reflection warp in the curved surface of the mug. His throat burned—not from the virus, but from the way she kept glancing at his shoulders, his jawline, like she was memorizing them. Like she thought they might vanish overnight.

Well they actually would sadly.

"The CDC has a fund," she continued, forcing her voice steady, though her fingers plucked at the hem of her shirt. "For... essentials. Undergarments. Skincare." She swallowed hard. "They said most families opt for the prepaid Visa—less paperwork that way."

Tyler's fingernails bit into his palms. Essentials. Like he was packing for some twisted summer camp where they'd teach him how to walk in heels instead of shoot arrows. "What about school?" The words came out hoarse, scraped raw from the inside.

"Extended leave of absence for a while, they have online classes for that kind of thing" his mother sounded hollowed out.

"Did you call Dad?"

She nodded. "He's in Boston. He's booked a flight".

The mug trembled in Tyler’s grip as he took a sip, the chamomile tea scalding his tongue—too hot, too sweet, wrong in ways he couldn’t articulate. His mother’s phone buzzed violently against the nightstand, the screen lighting up with a flood of notifications from the neighborhood watch group. He caught snippets—*confirmed case on Maple*, *CDC checkpoint at the high school*, *keep your teens inside*—before she flipped it face-down with a sharp exhale.

The mug slipped from Tyler’s fingers—not quite falling, but tilting enough that tea sloshed over the rim and onto his sheets. His mother snatched it away with a stifled gasp, but he barely registered the burn spreading across his thighs. The heat felt distant, secondary to the prickle crawling up his spine. His skin no longer fit right—too tight at the wrists, too loose at the neck—like someone had dressed him in a costume two sizes off.

The mug hit the nightstand with a dull thud. Tyler’s hands—still *his* hands, for now—clutched at the sheets as a fresh wave of nausea rolled through him. His mother’s fingers hovered near his shoulder, unsure whether to touch him or the medical bracelet Dr. Jones had snapped onto his wrist moments ago. The plastic tag burned against his skin, its embossed letters spelling out *STRAIN GAMMA* in stark red.

"I'll let you rest some more," she said, standing, taking both her phone and the mug with her.

Tyler was alone again. His own phone beeped, warning him of the low battery. He was too tired to take care of it.

Later, he thought.

Then fell asleep again.

******

Tyler jolted awake with a gasp, his pillow damp with sweat. Something tickled his neck—an insect, maybe—and he reached up to brush it away, only to freeze when his fingers tangled in long, silky strands that hadn’t been there hours ago. He yanked his hand back as if burned, heart hammering against his ribs. The bedroom was dark, but the streetlight outside cast enough glow to see the blonde locks coiled around his fingers, sleek and foreign.

Shit.

Tyler sat bolt upright, his breath ragged as he clawed at the strands clinging to his neck—too fine, too soft, like spiderwebs dipped in honey. The digital clock on his nightstand read 3:17 AM in searing red, hours since his mother had left.

He gently touched his hair, it was soft. Turning on the light near his bed, he slowly sat up. The only good thing about this was that the fever was finally gone. Just like Dr. Jones predicted it would be. He just never expected it to be gone this fast. He grabbed at a mirror that he sometimes kept on his nightstand, turning it slightly to see what he was working with now. There was no denying what he was seeing---his hair was lighter than Kayla's but longer now. Not as long as hers but touching his shoulders at least.

Shit.

The mirror tilted in Tyler's trembling hands, catching the sharp angles of his face—except they weren't sharp anymore. His jawline had softened overnight, the stubborn squareness now yielding to gentle curves. His Adam's apple sat less prominent against his throat, as if someone had sanded down the edges of his body while he slept. But it was his lips that made his breath hitch—fuller, pinker, with a natural Cupid's bow that hadn't been there yesterday. He pressed a fingertip to them, half-expecting the plumpness to deflate like a lie.

He looked like a feminized version of himself. Not quite an identical twin to Kayla but close. He could maybe pass for her androgynous sister now.

He spared a quick glance down and sighed in relief.

His chest was still flat as a board.

The mirror clattered onto the nightstand as Tyler scrambled out of bed—too fast, his vision swimming with black spots. He stumbled toward his ensuite bathroom, his legs feeling oddly uncoordinated, like his knees had been greased.

The bathroom light flickered on with a buzz that made Tyler wince. He braced against the sink, waiting for his vision to clear before daring to look in the mirror. The face staring back was his—but not. The same blue eyes, now fringed with lashes too thick to ignore. The same nose, but softer at the bridge. His collarbones protruded more sharply beneath skin that looked poreless, almost polished.

The hand mirror had not done his inspection justice.

He reached slowly into his pajama pants and was happy that his "little friend" was still there.

For now at least.

He actually read online it was one of the last things to go.

The bathroom tiles were cold beneath Tyler's bare feet as he leaned closer to the mirror, tracing the unfamiliar contours of his face with trembling fingers. His skin was smoother—not just in texture, but in actual structure—as if someone had airbrushed away the roughness of adolescence overnight. He pinched his cheek experimentally, half-expecting the flesh to peel away like clay, revealing something entirely new underneath.

He was pretty. A blessing and a curse. Kayla was well liked and popular, one of the prettier girls in school. He kinda knew what he was getting into because he was her twin after all. He wasn't done changing either, only a few hours in.

The creak of floorboards snapped Tyler’s head around so fast his new hair whipped across his face. Kayla stood frozen in his bathroom doorway, one hand still on the knob, her sleep-mussed hair sticking up in familiar cowlicks. Her mouth hung open slightly, her gaze darting from Tyler’s face to the mirror and back again.

She stared for a long time before she started crying. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry"

Tyler blinked. That wasn't the reaction he expected.

Instinctively, he rushed over to her and hugged her tight. He held her as she sobbed. He wasn't afraid of infecting her because he wasn't contagious, well not unless he kissed her which made him shudder to think about. Instead, he held her as she sobbed into his shoulder. He let her cry long and hard.

Kayla’s tears soaked through Tyler’s pajama shirt, warm against his collarbone where the skin had grown strangely sensitive. He could feel each shuddering breath she took, the way her fingers clutched at his back like she was afraid he’d dissolve if she let go. His own hands hovered awkwardly before settling on her shoulders—lighter than he remembered, the bones more delicate under his touch.

Tyler felt Kayla's grip tighten as her sobs subsided into hiccupping breaths. "You don't have to apologize," he murmured into her hair, which smelled faintly of her strawberry shampoo—the same brand she'd used since middle school. The familiarity of it grounded him, even as the weight of her body against his felt different, the angles of her shoulders fitting against his chest in ways they never had before.

The digital clock ticked over to 3:42 AM when Kayla finally pulled back, wiping her nose with the back of her hand in that unselfconscious way Tyler had seen a thousand times—except now her fingers looked slenderer next to his own, her wrists finer-boned. Moonlight caught the tear tracks on her cheeks as she sniffled. "It's my fault," she whispered hoarsely. "Sierra's party—I shouldn't have gone. I'm a fucking idiot."

Tyler reached out, tucking a strand of Kayla's messy hair behind her ear—a gesture he'd seen their mother do a thousand times, but one that felt oddly natural now. "Stop," he said, his voice softer than he intended. "You didn't know some random girl would shove her tongue down my throat."

Kayla let out a wet, startled laugh at that, her breath hitching as she wiped her eyes again. "God, when you say it like that..." She trailed off, her gaze flickering over Tyler's face—lingering on his fuller lips, his smoothed jawline—awed. "Shit, you're me"

Kayla's fingers hovered near Tyler's cheekbone, not quite touching. "No," she murmured after a moment, tilting her head. "You're like... almost me maybe." Her thumb brushed the corner of his eye—where the lashes now curled without mascara. "Your eyes are still yours, though."

Kayla's eyes were green. It was the weird thing about them. They were not at all close to being identical when they were brother and sister. He was taller, still was apparently. He had blue eyes, hers were green. Her hair was honey blonde, his was almost sun bleached.

The bathroom mirror fogged slightly from their combined breath as Tyler and Kayla stood shoulder-to-shoulder, studying their reflections like mismatched bookends. Tyler's new hair curled slightly at the ends where it brushed his collarbones—lighter than Kayla's honey-blonde, almost platinum under the harsh fluorescent light. Kayla reached out, twisting a strand around her finger. "It's softer than mine," she murmured, her voice still thick from crying. "Does it feel weird?"

He shrugged. "Jury's still out" He brushed a strand absently behind an ear, like she did some times. "This is only after a few hours".

"Almost all day technically" she corrected. "You've been asleep since this morning, it's now technically another whole morning"

He groaned. So almost 24 hours. How had he not noticed that?

Kayla’s fingers twitched toward her phone in her pajama pocket—Tyler knew that nervous tic. She bit her lip. "We should document this," she said quietly. "For science."

Before he could say anything, she took out her phone and snapped a pic of him.

Tyler blinked at the sudden flash, his reflection in the mirror momentarily replaced by the afterimage burned into his retinas. "Did you seriously just—?"

"Day One of Taylor" she said happily.

"Who's Taylor?" he asked, utterly confused.

"You silly" she said, happy with herself.

"You can't just..."

"Well I did," she said triumphantly. "Deal with it"

The flash of Kayla’s phone camera left spots dancing in Tyler’s vision as she grinned at the screen, thumbs already flying across the keyboard. “Stop,” he groaned, reaching for the phone, but she danced back with a smirk, holding it just out of reach—a move perfected over years of sibling rivalry. His lunge sent him stumbling, his center of gravity off-kilter in a way that made his knees buckle. Kayla’s smirk faltered as she caught his elbow, her grip firm despite the new delicacy of his bones.

"I wasn't going to post it, was saving it to a folder" she said, steadying him.

He sighed. She had a point. "As long as they don't pop up all over your socials, I'm ok with it"

The mattress dipped under their combined weight as Tyler and Kayla settled onto his bed, knees brushing in a way that would've felt accidental before but now carried an unspoken awareness of space—his space, her space, the inches between them suddenly loaded with everything unsaid. Tyler plucked at his pajama pants, the fabric pooling differently around his hips now. "So," he started, then stopped, staring at the fraying seam of his comforter.

Kayla flopped backward onto his pillows, her hair fanning out in messy waves. "So," she echoed, stretching the word out until it lost all meaning. She rolled onto her side, propping her head on one hand, studying him with an intensity that made his skin prickle. "Does it hurt?"

Tyler's fingers drifted to his throat, where the skin felt taut and strangely sensitive. "Not... hurt, exactly." He swallowed, noticing how the motion no longer made his Adam's apple bob as prominently. "More like growing pains. But inside out."

Kayla's nose scrunched—their mother's exact expression when confronted with biology homework. "Gross." She reached out, poking his cheek with one finger. "You're warmer than usual."

"Still running a low-grade fever, probably." Tyler caught her wrist before she could poke him again, startled by how slender it felt in his grip. Kayla didn't pull away. Instead, her fingers curled around his, her thumb brushing the newly softened knuckles. The silence stretched, thick with all the arguments they weren't having.

The digital clock on Tyler's nightstand clicked over to 4:13 AM when Kayla finally spoke again, her voice quieter than he'd ever heard it. "Remember when we used to share clothes?"

He groaned. "I remember when you used to force me to wear your clothes!"

Kayla kicked him lightly under the covers, grinning. "You looked cute in that sundress."

Tyler grabbed a pillow and threw it at her face, but there was no heat behind it—just this strange, giddy lightness that made his chest ache in a way that had nothing to do with the virus. Kayla caught the pillow with a laugh, hugging it to her chest as she studied him with an expression he couldn't quite place—not pity, not curiosity, but something raw and unfiltered that made him suddenly aware of how close they were sitting.

"You're still you," she said finally, poking his shoulder. "Just... prettier."

Tyler snorted, shoving her hand away. "Shut up." But he couldn't help glancing at the mirror across the room, catching the blurred reflection of them side by side—his hair catching the dim light in a way Kayla's never had, his profile softer against the sharp angles of her face. He swallowed hard. "Does Mom know?"

Kayla nodded. "She was in here a couple of hours ago"

He blinked. "And?"

Kayla shrugged, picking at a loose thread on his comforter. "She cried. A lot."

Tyler swallowed, staring at his hands—still his, but softer now, the knuckles less pronounced. He flexed his fingers, watching the tendons move differently under skin that looked poreless in the dim light.

"Dad?" he asked.

Kayla sighed. "Flight delayed. He keeps texting for updates"

They sat in silence. The air between them hummed with all the things they weren't saying—the fights, the slammed doors, the cruel words hurled like weapons during one of their endless battles over bathroom time or chores or nothing at all. Tyler realized with a start that this was the longest they'd gone without arguing since middle school.

He wasn't sure what it was actually.

Kayla's fingers lingered on Tyler's wrist—not gripping, not pulling away—just resting there like she'd forgotten how to let go. It was like there was this subtle shift now in their relationship, something tectonic moving beneath the surface of all their old patterns. The usual barbed teasing felt dulled at the edges, the competitive tension replaced by an unspoken vigilance. Tyler realized with a start that Kayla was studying him the way their mother checked the stove burner—three glances to be sure it was really off.

The digital clock ticked over to 4:27 AM when Kayla abruptly stood, her knees popping loudly in the quiet room. "You hungry?" she asked, already heading for the door—not waiting for an answer because she already knew he was. That part hadn't changed. What had changed was the way she paused in the doorway, looking back at him with her brow furrowed like she was memorizing the slope of his new jawline.

Tyler followed her downstairs, his sock feet whispering against the hardwood. His center of gravity felt off—not enough to stumble, but enough that he noticed the way his hips moved differently, the way his shoulders automatically pulled back to compensate. Kayla's head turned slightly as she walked ahead of him, as if she could hear the unsteadiness in his steps.

"C'mon Bambi," she teased.

"Screw you" he said, sticking out his tongue.

She laughed.

Tyler had expected pity, or worse—revulsion—from Kayla when she saw his changes. Instead, she'd slipped back into their old rhythm with unsettling ease, like his feminization was just another quirk to be mocked. It was unsettling in its normalcy. The fridge light bathed Kayla in a sickly yellow glow as she rummaged through leftovers, her movements jerky with restless energy. Tyler leaned against the kitchen island, his hips pressing into the counter's edge in a way that would've bruised yesterday. The tile floor chilled his feet through his socks.

"It's weird, right?" Kayla asked abruptly, slamming the fridge door with her hip. She held two yogurts—strawberry for her, blueberry for him—like nothing had changed. But everything had. "How normal this feels?"

The yogurt container felt foreign in Tyler's grip—his fingers too slender against the plastic, the lid resisting his usual twist-and-pop technique. Kayla watched, eyebrows raised, as he struggled before surrendering it to her with a muttered curse. She popped it open effortlessly and slid it back across the counter, her smirk fading when she noticed the tremor in his hands.

The yogurt tasted like ash in Tyler's mouth, but he forced it down anyway, watching Kayla lick her spoon clean with the same exaggerated relish she'd had since they were six. The kitchen clock ticked loudly—4:39 AM—and somewhere outside, a dog barked.

The two of them sat at the kitchen table, eating their yogurt.

Kayla's spoon clattered against her empty yogurt cup, forgotten. She stared across the kitchen table, her gaze tracing the unfamiliar lines of Tyler's face with an intensity that made his skin prickle. The dawn light filtering through the blinds painted them both in watery stripes—illuminating how Tyler's new hair caught the light in a way Kayla's never had, throwing golden highlights against cheekbones that were hers but not.

"You're staring," Tyler muttered, pushing his half-eaten yogurt away.

"I know," Kayla breathed, unblinking. Her fingers twitched toward his face before curling back into her palm. "It's just—you look so much like me now"

He snorted. "Its that freaky twin thing"

"I know this is going to sound really fucking horrible but I always wished you were my sister" she admitted.

Tyler froze mid-bite, his spoon hovering halfway to his mouth. The yogurt dripped onto the table with a wet plop. "You—what?"

Kayla's cheeks flushed pink as she suddenly found the pattern of the tablecloth fascinating. "Not—not like this obviously." She gestured vaguely at his softening jawline, his longer lashes. "Just... you know. Growing up." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "Sometimes I'd pretend."

The admission hung between them like smoke—impossible to ignore, impossible to grasp. Tyler's fingers tightened around his spoon. He'd spent fifteen years orbiting Kayla's sunshine, never guessing she'd wanted him closer. The kitchen clock ticked loudly in the silence—4:43 AM—the minute hand trembling as if unsure where to go next.

Kayla reached across the table, her fingertips brushing the back of Tyler's hand—so lightly he might have imagined it. "Your freckles are gone," she murmured, tracing the space where his summer constellations used to be. Her touch left trails of heat on his strangely smooth skin.

Tyler caught her wrist, feeling the rabbit-quick pulse beneath his thumb. "Which ones did I have?" he challenged, watching her blink in surprise. They'd played this game since kindergarten—mapping each other's moles like star charts—but now his skin was a blank slate.

Kayla's fingers fluttered to his nose. "One here," she whispered, pressing the tip. "Like someone dabbed you with a paintbrush." Her touch drifted to his temple—"Two here, almost touching"—then skated down to his collarbone, making him shiver. "And a cluster here that looked like Orion."

They shared a laugh.

The fluorescent kitchen light buzzed to life with a harsh click, flooding the room in sterile white. Tyler and Kayla jerked apart like guilty conspirators—her fingers still hovering near his collarbone where Orion's freckles had vanished. Their mother stood frozen in the doorway, one hand clutching her robe closed at the throat, the other gripping an empty water glass so tightly her knuckles bleached white.

"Oh," she breathed—not a word so much as punched-out air. The glass slipped from her fingers, shattering against the tile with a crystalline crash that made Tyler flinch violently. His mother didn't seem to notice the mess. She took one halting step forward, then another, her gaze locked on Tyler's face with horrified fascination. "Sweetheart, you're—"

"Me?" Kayla supplied helpfully, kicking her chair back with a screech to kneel beside the broken glass.

Their mother shook her head mutely, reaching toward Tyler's cheek but stopping millimeters away, as if afraid he'd dissolve under her touch. Her wedding band glinted under the lights—the same hand that had cradled his feverish forehead yesterday, when his features were still recognizably his. Now her fingers trembled in the space between them, tracing the air where his jawline had softened overnight into something softer, more delicate.

Tyler swallowed hard. "Hey Mom."

"We were eating," Kayla explained as she scooped up some of the broken glass. "She was hungry".

She? Tyler flinched at the new pronoun. He wasn't expecting it, not yet anyway. He knew it was coming of course but he was hoping to hold onto himself a little longer.

The kitchen clock ticked louder in the silence that followed Kayla's casual pronoun slip. Tyler's mother inhaled sharply, her eyes darting between her children—one kneeling in broken glass, the other gripping the table edge with hands that no longer looked like her son's. The refrigerator hummed to life with a sudden buzz, making all three of them jump.

The shards of glass caught the overhead light like jagged stars as Kayla carefully gathered them into her cupped palm. Tyler watched his mother's face—the way her lips trembled, the way her gaze kept flicking between him and the floor, as if unsure where to look.

"It's ok, Mom," he said, reaching forward and patting her hand.

It was too. It was really weird. All week he'd been freaking out about this possibility and now that it had happened, he was calm? How did that make any sense? Even scarier was that he was strangely relieved. It was like this huge weight had been lifted off his chest suddenly. Not that he ever in a million years wanted this but he wasn't pissed about it like he thought he was going to be.

Was it the mental reconditioning?

Kayla threw out the glass then proceeded to dispose of their empty yogurt containers.

The overhead light flickered once—a brief stutter in time—as Tyler's mother exhaled sharply, her fingers finally closing around his. Her grip was warm, familiar, yet everything about the moment felt alien. Tyler watched their joined hands with detached curiosity—his fingers slimmer now, the knuckles less pronounced, his mother's wedding band pressing into skin that no longer bore his childhood scars.

"I think we should all get a few more hours of sleep," his mother finally said after their long moment of silence.

Kayla groaned. "Mom, she's been sleeping all day!"

Tyler's mother flinched at Kayla's pronoun like she'd been slapped, her grip tightening around Tyler's hand. "She?" The word cracked in her throat.

Kayla nodded. "I know it sucks but it's got to happen"

The fluorescent light buzzed overhead as Tyler watched his mother’s face crumple. Her grip on his hand went slack, her fingers retreating to press against her own lips as if holding back a sob.

Tyler looked at his sister. They shared a look but neither said anything.

"Ok Mom" he finally said. "I'll try to get some more sleep"

Even though Kayla was right. He wasn't tired at all.

He and Kayla left the kitchen, heading up the stairs together.

"She's not dealing with this at all" Kayla whispered, shaking her head.

Tyler sighed. "Give her some time"

Tyler turned and started for his room when she grabbed his wrist and dragged him into a hug. She held him softly, burying her face in his shoulder.

"We got this....sis" she said after pulling away and going to her room.

Tyler sighed.

He went over to his bed, sitting on the ledge. He turned and found his phone on the nightstand. He picked it up to check his texts but it was dead.

Tyler stared at the blank screen of his phone like it had personally betrayed him. The charger dangled uselessly from the outlet—he must've forgotten to plug it in during last night's feverish haze. He pressed the power button three times in rapid succession, as if sheer willpower could resurrect the dead device. Nothing.

He started charging it, turning it on as it did so.

A minute or two later, he was greeted by loads of texts. All from Benny and Callie. He groaned, remembering how he hadn't talked to Benny at all. He'd left his best friend in the dark completely.

He checked the time, it was a little after 5am now. He bit his lip, wondering if Benny was even awake. He risked it and called.

Benny picked up on the second ring, his voice raspy with sleep but sharp with concern. "Dude. Where the hell have you been?"

Tyler took a deep breath and let out a "Hey".

There was a pause. "Kay? Why are you on Ty's phone? What happened? Is he ok?"

Tyler was shocked. Did he actually sound like Kayla now?

He cleared his throat. "This isn't Kayla".

Benny's sharp inhale crackled through the phone line. "No fucking way." The mattress springs squeaked violently—Benny sitting up too fast. "Tell me this is Kayla punking me. Tell me you're—"

"Benny, it's me," Tyler said, his voice catching on the words. The sound of his own speech startled him—higher, softer, threaded with unfamiliar cadences.

The silence stretched so long Tyler thought the call had dropped. Then Benny exhaled hard—a rush of static against Tyler's ear. "Jesus Christ." Another pause. "You? When? What happened?"

The phone pressed hot against Tyler's ear as he slumped onto his bed, staring at his reflection in the darkened window—a ghost girl with Kayla's bone structure and his own wide, panicked eyes. "Remember Sierra's Bug Bash?" His voice sounded foreign even to himself—not quite Kayla's crisp alto, but something fluttery and uncertain.

Benny's sharp intake crackled through the speaker. "The one you told me NOT to go to!"

"Yeah well—" Tyler's fingers twisted in the comforter, nails catching on fabric that suddenly felt too rough against his sensitive skin. He swallowed hard, remembering the damp press of bodies in Sierra's basement, the way the unnamed girl ambushed him. "Some girl cornered me. She was—" His throat closed around the memory of her feverish skin, the unnatural gleam in her eyes as she'd whispered *you're going to be so beautiful* before sealing her lips over his.

Benny's muttered curse sounded like it had been punched out of him. "You kissed her?"

"She kissed me!"

The silence stretched thin before Benny exhaled sharply. "That's so fucked up!"

"You're telling me" Tyler sighed. "Its a fast one as you can hear. Like Jason apparently."

There was another pause. "You're not all stupid now, right?"

Tyler felt the idea hit him like a physical force—half impulse, half survival instinct. He pitched his voice higher, letting it go breathy and vacant as he twirled a strand of his new blonde hair around one finger. "Ohmygod Benny," he gushed, batting eyelashes that felt strangely heavy now, "did you see Jasmine’s new lip gloss tutorial? It’s like, soooo fetch."

The silence on the line was absolute. Tyler could practically hear Benny’s brain short-circuiting through the phone. He bit the inside of his cheek—still soft, still unfamiliar—to keep from laughing.

"You're going to be one of those twisted bitches, aren't you?"

They both laughed.

"In all seriousness though, I feel fine" he finally said. "Better than fine, I'm calm. Its really fucking weird".

"Dude, I'd be freaking out," Benny admitted.

The mattress creaked as Tyler shifted, pressing the phone harder against his ear. "I should be freaking out. All week I've been—" His voice hitched. He swallowed, surprised by the lump in his throat. "But now that it's happening? I just feel... relieved."

"That's so weird" Benny mumbled.

Tyler bit his lip, turning the phone and taking a selfie. He debated sending it but did anyway. "No, this is weird" he said seconds after hitting send.

Benny's sharp inhale hissed through the speaker. "Holy shit." The line went staticky with his sudden movement—probably sitting up too fast again. "You look exactly like—"

"Well she is my twin," Tyler laughed.

"Your sister must be freaking out"

"That's the weird bit. She's been really chill about it. We talked this morning. No fighting. Just talking. She was really upset at first, blaming herself but then..." He lowered his voice for some reason even though he was alone. "She admitted she always wanted a sister"

Benny's choked laugh crackled through the speaker. "No fucking way."

"It is what it is," Tyler sighed.

There was a moment of silence before Benny asked the million dollar question. Well at least for him:

"So have your boobs grown yet?"

Tyler sighed and rolled his eyes. "And that is why you don't have a girlfriend"

"Not yet," said Benny.

Tyler laughed. "Bye Benny".

He hung up, shaking his head. A second later, he sent the same selfie with a text to Callie.

Callie called.

The phone buzzed violently in Tyler's palm, Callie's caller ID flashing like a warning light. He hesitated—thumb hovering over the answer button—before exhaling sharply and swiping right.

The phone pressed cold against Tyler's cheek as Callie's voice—unusually breathless—cut through the silence.

"Jesus fucking Christ," Callie whispered through the phone, the words ragged like she'd been running. Tyler heard fabric rustling—her sitting up too fast, sheets tangling around her legs. There was a long pause. "Are you...?"

He knew what she wanted to know. "I'm still me. Well I'm turning into my sister's identical twin now but I'm not different."

Callie sighed in relief. "I'm not sure what would have happened if you became another Jasmine"

"I'm glad too, the thought had me terrified, especially after that stream" Tyler said, relieved.

"How's your family dealing with it?" she asked then added. "I've been talking with Becca, you know Jasmine's sister? Anyway, her parents aren't taking it well."

Tyler nodded. "Mom is...dealing. Dad is still on his way, so who knows".

"And Kayla?"

Tyler bit his lip. "She told me she'd always wanted a sister."

Callie's sharp laugh crackled through the phone. "No fucking way."

The bedroom door creaked open before Tyler could respond to Callie. Kayla stood silhouetted in the doorway, her pajamas rumpled, hair a chaotic halo from tossing in bed. She held two hair ties between her teeth, her fingers busy twisting her own hair into a messy bun.

"Speak of the devil," Tyler said as Kayla flopped onto the bed.

Kayla absently got behind him on the bed and started pulling his hair into a ponytail. Her fingers moved through the unfamiliar golden strands with surprising confidence—separating, gathering, twisting—as if she'd done this a thousand times before. Which, Tyler realized with a jolt, she had. Just never to him. The elastic snapped against his scalp with a sharp sting, making him hiss.

"You ok?" asked Callie, concerned.

"I have a ponytail now apparently" he said, confused.

Kayla snorted, her breath warm against the back of his neck as she adjusted the tension. "Relax, drama queen. It's just hair." Her fingers lingered for a second longer than necessary, tracing the newly exposed line of his nape where baby hairs curled in a dawn humidity. Tyler shivered.

"I think I'm gonna let you sister bond" said Callie with a laugh and she hung up before Tyler could stop her.

The phone screen dimmed as Kayla leaned over Tyler's shoulder, her chin hooking onto the crook of his neck. "Callie?" she asked, her breath tickling his ear—warm and familiar despite everything.

Tyler turned the phone facedown on the mattress, the sudden absence of Callie's voice making Kayla's presence feel heavier. Her chin still rested on his shoulder, her fingers now idly playing with the ends of his ponytail.

The ponytail tugged lightly as Kayla toyed with it, her fingers occasionally brushing the sensitive skin behind Tyler's ear—each touch sending strange little shocks down his spine. He could smell her shampoo—something fruity and artificial—mixed with the sleep-warm scent of her skin. It was unsettling how normal this felt, how easily their bodies rearranged themselves into this new configuration of sisterhood.

"This is weird, right?" he asked, unsure and not used to his sister being this friendly.

Kayla's fingers stilled in his hair. "Only if you make it weird," she said, voice muffled against his shoulder. Then she pulled back abruptly, her knee digging into the mattress as she shifted to face him. "Does it feel weird?"

Tyler studied Kayla's face—her furrowed brows, the way she chewed the inside of her cheek when nervous. Same tell since third grade. "It feels like..." He reached up to touch the ponytail, fingertips brushing the smooth elastic band. "Like I woke up in someone else's life but all the furniture's in the right places."

The sunlight hit Kayla’s freckles differently now—or maybe Tyler was just seeing them differently. She sat cross-legged on his bed, knees bumping against his thigh as she scrolled through her phone with one hand, the other absently twisting a strand of Tyler’s hair around her finger. The motion was absentminded, habitual, like she’d done it a thousand times before. Which she had. Just never to him.

She pulled him close and took a selfie of the two of them before he could respond.

The phone camera flashed, freezing Tyler mid-protest—mouth half-open, one hand raised in futile defense while Kayla grinned triumphantly beside him. She studied the screen with narrowed eyes, tongue caught between her teeth. "Huh," she murmured, thumb swiping to enlarge the image. "Your eyelashes are way longer than mine now. That's bullshit."

Tyler grabbed for the phone, but Kayla twisted away, her knee digging into his thigh as she held the screen just out of reach. "Give it—" His voice cracked mid-sentence, the pitch jumping unpredictably. Kayla's grin widened.

Kayla laughed. "Its folder fodder, more documentation"

The mattress dipped as Kayla flopped onto her stomach beside Tyler, her phone screen illuminating the faint down now dusting his forearms—another change he hadn't noticed until this moment. She zoomed in on their selfie, her thumb smudging the glass. "Your pores are smaller too," she announced, as clinically detached as a dermatologist. "Gamma's weirdly good at skincare."

"I wouldn't know," he said truthfully.

"You will" Kayla stated it as if it was fact. "You're my sister now. You're gonna know it all"

He wasn't sure what to think of that.

"I'm still a boy you know" he said, hoping to deter her.

"For now" she said giggling.

Kayla's fingers drummed against Tyler's knee—a rapid staccato that betrayed her excitement despite the forced casualness of her sprawl across his bed. "First rule," she said, holding up one finger with exaggerated solemnity, "you never share your good hair ties. Those are sacred." Her grin turned wicked. "Second rule—when Mom asks who ate the last yogurt, it was always you."

Tyler rolled his eyes, but something warm unfurled in his chest—an odd mix of exasperation and affection. Kayla's knee dug into his thigh as she shifted closer, her phone forgotten on the mattress as she started counting off on her fingers. "Third, you let me do your brows before you leave the house again unless you want to look like a pre-plucked chicken." Her gaze flicked to his forehead critically. "Gamma gave you arch potential, but left the landscaping to me."

The morning light caught the downy hairs along Tyler's jawline—still faint, but noticeably finer than yesterday. Kayla's thumb brushed against them absently as she continued her list, her voice dropping into a mock-conspiratorial whisper.

"And when your period starts—"

Tyler choked on air. "Jesus, Kayla!"

"—which it *will*," she plowed on, ignoring his spluttering, "you steal my tampons from the bathroom cabinet, never the ones in my backpack. Those are emergency stock." Her grin turned sly. "Also? Buy chocolate *before* you need it. You'll thank me later."

"Sage advice?" he asked, amused and more than a bit grossed out.

"There's way more!" she admitted.

Kayla's enthusiasm was bordering on manic as she rolled onto her side, propping her head up with one hand. "Makeup tips," she announced, ticking them off on her fingers. "You don't need foundation yet, but when you do, blend downward or you'll clog your pores. Waterproof mascara only after the tear-duct changes start—trust me, you'll cry at dog commercials." Her finger jabbed toward his chest. "And never let Mom near your eyeliner unless you want to look like a raccoon that fought a Sharpie."

Tyler blinked. "You've put way too much thought into this."

"Not done! Stop interrupting!"

Kayla's knee dug into Tyler's thigh as she leaned closer, her eyes gleaming with the fervor of a cult leader initiating a new member. "Boys are idiots," she declared. "They'll say they don't care about hair products but they'll sniff your shampoo like bloodhounds." Her fingers twitched toward Tyler's ponytail again. "Also, never leave conditioner in overnight unless you want your pillow to feel like a used teabag in the morning."

Tyler opened his mouth—probably to protest—but Kayla steamrolled over him. "Now, bras." She clapped her hands together sharply. "When Gamma finally gets around to those, don't let Mom take you shopping. She'll try to put you in something that looks like Grandma's parachute silk." Her nose wrinkled. "We'll raid my drawer first, then hit up Victoria's Secret during a sale like civilized people."

Tyler laughed. He was overwhelmed and while he should have felt annoyed, he didn't. It was weirdly strange and comforting.

"We'll leave it there for now or at least until you finish being all girlied up" Kayla jumped off the bed, humming to herself as she left.

Tyler groaned, wondering what he just accidentally agreed too.

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF

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Author's Note:Here we are part 4. Only one more part to go now. I'm almost finished with the sequel as well. After that I think I'm going to take a break from Taylor and her story. There's a story I've been wanting to tell for awhile and quite a few others I have yet to finish.I appreciate any kind of feedback or comments that people might have :).
 

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4.

After surviving Typhoon Kayla for the second time in so many hours, he retired to gaming.

He only played for a little bit though before he found himself bored.

Tyler's fingers hovered over the controller, the usual adrenaline rush of headshots and kill streaks feeling oddly flat. His character sprinted across the virtual battlefield, but his mind kept drifting—to the way his collarbones looked sharper in the mirror this morning, to the unfamiliar swish of hair against his neck whenever he turned his head too fast. By his third consecutive death (a record), he tossed the controller aside with a sigh that came out suspiciously close to a huff—another new vocal quirk that felt almost Kayla in nature.

When noon came around, he got hungry.

The waistband of Tyler's jeans bit into his hips before he even managed to fasten the button. He frowned at the mirror, tugging at the denim that had fit perfectly yesterday—now gaping at the waist yet straining across hips that had somehow widened overnight. The pajama pants hadn't lied exactly, but their forgiving elastic had hidden the truth his favorite Levi's now shouted: his pelvis had tilted forward, creating a curve where there'd once been angles.

He turned slightly, doing that all too stereotypical female looking at her butt pose.

Had it gotten bigger? Were his hips wider too?

He groaned, peeling off his favorite jeans. He went back to the dresser and found some sweat pants. When he pulled them on, they fit better but still not perfect. He paired them with a baggy shirt, hoping it was enough.

The refrigerator hummed like a disapproving chaperone as Tyler shuffled into the kitchen, his oversized shirt swallowing what remained of his masculine frame. His mother’s coffee cup froze midway to her lips but she said nothing. The silence was worse.

The refrigerator door hadn't even clicked shut before Kayla's voice sliced through the kitchen like a butter knife through warm margarine. "Oh hell no." Her bare feet slapped against the linoleum as she rounded the island, her critical gaze raking over Tyler's oversized shirt and sagging sweatpants. "You look like a depressed laundry hamper."

"Nothing fits right anymore" he admitted shyly.

Kayla's hands landed on her hips with the precision of a drill sergeant inspecting a sloppy recruit. "First of all," she said, plucking at Tyler's drooping collar with two fingers like it offended her personally, "we're burning this shirt. Like, ceremonially. With gasoline." Her nose wrinkled as she stepped back, taking in the full tragic ensemble. "Did you raid Dad's gym bag or something? Because this is a crime against fabric."

Kayla's fingers snapped like a disgruntled fashion designer as she circled Tyler, her eyes narrowing at each new sartorial offense. "Second of all," she announced, plucking at his sagging sweatpants waistband with two fingers like it was contaminated, "these are going straight to the donation bin." Her nose scrunched. "Are those paint stains? Did you mug a janitor?"

Kayla disappeared upstairs with the urgency of a paramedic responding to a fashion emergency. Tyler heard her footsteps thunder down the hallway, followed by the violent yanking of drawers and the crash of hangers in her closet.

She returned in under three minutes—a record—her arms loaded with fabric like a stylist on deadline. "Okay," she announced, dumping the pile onto the kitchen island with the gravity of a surgeon presenting donor organs. "Strip."

"Kayla!" her mother gasped.

"What?" Kayla asked confused. "We're all girls here"

Tyler choked on air. "I'm not—"

"—yet," Kayla finished with a wink, tossing the bundle of fabric at Tyler's chest before turning dramatically toward the refrigerator. Her bare feet squeaked against the linoleum as she pivoted, her ponytail whipping around like a metronome set to allegro. "But you will be soon enough, and until then?" She yanked open the fridge door with unnecessary force, sending condiment bottles rattling. "You're not leaving this house looking like a rejected extra from *The Walking Dead*."

He didn't actually plan on leaving the house.

"He can't leave actually" Their mother confirmed. "Not until he virus is fully out of his system. At least a month".

Tyler stared down at the heap of fabric in his arms—a soft gray V-neck that smelled faintly of Kayla's vanilla body spray and black yoga pants with a subtle galaxy print. The waistband still held the curved memory of Kayla's hips. He cleared his throat. "I'm not wearing your pants."

"Shut up and put them on" she snapped, annoyed.

He reluctantly did as he was told.

The galaxy-print yoga pants clung to Tyler's thighs in a way no fabric ever had before—not uncomfortably tight, but with an intimate awareness of every new curve. He tugged at the waistband self-consciously, the elastic settling just below his hipbones in a way that felt scandalously natural. Kayla's V-neck draped loosely enough to preserve some dignity, though the neckline kept sliding to expose one sharply defined collarbone.

He felt weird but strangely comfortable.

Kayla's grin stretched wide enough to crack her face when Tyler shuffled back into the kitchen, the galaxy yoga pants clinging to every new curve like they'd been custom-painted on. She circled him with the predatory glee of a sculptor surveying a finished masterpiece, her fingers twitching like she wanted to pinch his waist just to hear him squeak. "Look at you," she crowed, plucking at the V-neck's drooping collar. "Practically edible."

"Great" he deadpanned. "Just what I always wanted".

"Trust me, it's a good thing" she said, practically bouncing with joy.

The sandwich knife scraped against ceramic with a rhythmic screech as Kayla assembled her masterpiece—turkey slices fanned with the precision of a blackjack dealer, avocado mashed to gallery-worthy smoothness. "Okay, first rule of lunch," she announced, wielding the mayo jar like Excalibur, "you never put condiments directly on the bread unless you want sogginess." Her tongue poked between her teeth as she dotted each slice with surgical precision. "Second rule—"

"Kay, I know how to make a sandwich" Tyler interrupted, taking a bite of the sandwich he just made.

She frowned but ignored the comment.

Kayla's knee bumped against Tyler's under the kitchen table—three sharp knocks like Morse code for *pay attention*. "Next up," she announced around a mouthful of turkey avocado, pointing her sandwich at Tyler's torso with the gravitas of a general mapping a battlefield, "we're tackling posture." Her free hand swooped in to prod between Tyler's shoulder blades, forcing him upright with an indignant squawk. "Shoulders back, chin level—Gamma gave you collarbones that could cut glass, might as well show them off."

Tyler laughed but up straighter when Kayla glared.

She smiled. "Good girl".

Things like this went on all afternoon. Tyler finally escaped to his room, exhausted. He loved his sister but she a bit much. He got it though. He saw it earlier---the way she kept clinging to him, the way she kept staring. The way she didn't seem to want to leave his side. She was still feeling guilty.

In his room, he sighed and sat on his bed. He pulled out his phone and finally called Callie. When she answered, he sighed heavily.

"So," Callie's voice crackled through the phone speaker, laced with amusement, "let me get this straight—Kayla's treating your feminization like her personal Build-A-Bear workshop?"

Tyler flopped backwards, the galaxy-print pants stretching tight across his hips as he rolled onto his back. "More like she's Frankensteining me into the sister she always wanted."

Callie laughed. "It's a Girl, It's a Girl!"

They shared a laugh.

"So when do they let you out of the house?" asked Callie after a moment of silence.

"A month" he said with a sigh.

"A month?" she asked, sounding confused. "But Jasmine is out and about now"

Tyler's fingers tightened around the phone. "Wait—what?" The mattress springs creaked as he sat up abruptly, Kayla's borrowed shirt slipping off one shoulder. "Jasmine's outside already? But she transformed, what, five days ago?"

The line went silent long enough that Tyler thought Callie had dropped the call. Then her voice came through, lower now—the kind of tone reserved for sharing secrets in crowded hallways. "She was streaming from some bistro yesterday," A pause. Tyler heard her swallow. "Its like she's a whole different person."

That made no sense. Why does Jasmine get preferential treatment?

Callie grunted. "Guess it pays to be related to the Mayor".

"Are her parents still not dealing?" he asked, worried.

"Apparently" Callie sighed heavily. "Becca says it's freaky. There's a lot of tension. Jason has never had a great relationship with them but this gender flip is causing a whole new set of problems"

That was one of the things that still terrified him. His change wasn't fully over and in the back of his mind, he was still afraid that he might become just like Jasmine. It also scared him how his Mom would deal with something like that. Kayla was difficult but she was sane for the most part. She was a little needy but she wasn't this vapid, fake egirl. The idea of going from some normal, level headed guy into some shallow, self-centered plastic Barbie probably scared most guys.

Callie finally broke the silence. "So" she said, pausing and choosing her words carefully. "How close am I to having a full blooded girl friend?"

Callie couldn't see his shrug. "They said 48 hours, right? Its been about a day or so. So I'm guessing tomorrow or maybe the day after."

"Let me be your first visitor?" she asked, sincerity in her voice.

"Sure" he said, without a second guess.

They talked for a bit more, her mostly talking about returning to school next week. He didn't envy her but he was already getting bored.

The rest of the day, he once again tried to distract himself with gaming but it didn't work. Kayla managed to drag him out of his room before dinner and they sat on the couch. She tried to get him interested in one of her shows but he half paid attention. He started to feel a little warn out and his limbs felt heavy.

He ended up going to bed early, wondering and knowing what tomorrow would probably bring.

The changes wracked his body the whole night but thankfully for him---like the first night---he slept through them all.

Tyler woke to the sensation of fabric clinging where fabric had never clung before. The sheets bunched oddly under his hips—softer, fuller—and when he instinctively rolled onto his side, the weight distribution felt foreign, as if his center of gravity had shifted overnight. His collarbones pressed against Kayla's borrowed pajama top in a way that made the thin cotton suddenly feel like a second skin.

He sat up too fast, his longer hair whipping around his shoulders in a blonde curtain that smelled faintly of the vanilla shampoo Kayla had forced on him last night. The movement made his head swim—not unpleasantly, but with the dizzying lightness of shedding something invisible. His hands flew to his chest, fingers skimming over curves that hadn't been there when he'd collapsed into bed. The softness under his palms was undeniable, the kind of biological reality that made his throat tighten.

Breasts. Heavy. Feeling bigger than they probably were.

Was it done?

He absently reached for his crouch, gently padding there.

There was nothing.

Tyler's feet hit the floor with unsteady precision, his hips automatically adjusting to compensate for the new weight distribution—an instinct he hadn't possessed yesterday. The mirror above his dresser showed only the top of a blonde head as he shuffled toward the bathroom, his steps cautious like he was learning to walk on a ship's deck during a storm. The doorknob felt smaller in his grip, or maybe his fingers had gotten slimmer—both possibilities equally surreal.

Tyler's reflection in the bathroom mirror wasn't a stranger, but it wasn't him either. The girl blinking back had Kayla's almond-shaped eyes, but softer at the edges—less mascara, more bewildered vulnerability. He watched her—*him*—raise trembling fingers to trace the new contours of his face. His jawline had melted into something gently rounded, his Adam's apple gone completely. When he swallowed, the smooth column of his throat moved in a way that felt borrowed from a hundred romantic movie close-ups.

He looked like Kayla but not quite. There was subtle differences. The most striking were her eyes and hair. The eyes were still blue and the hair a lighter shade of blonde, much like it had been before. It was strange and new but familiar too. He expected this. Kayla was his twin after all, he was bound to look like her.

Turning his head, it felt strange to have so much hair now. Whereas yesterday, it had been at his shoulders, now it was halfway down his back. It was straight and silky and soft to the touch. So like his sister but so different. Kayla's hair had a slight wave to it and was like gold.

He finally tore himself away from the mirror as his bladder angrily protested. He looked at the toilet, groaned and built up the courage.

He peed as if on autopilot.

After flushing he headed back into his room and checked the clock, it was 6:04am.

Tyler sank onto the edge of the bed, the mattress dipping differently under his new weight. He pressed his palms flat against his thighs—Kayla's borrowed pajama pants now fitting with disturbing accuracy—and took a slow inventory. His ribcage felt narrower when he breathed, the expansion of his lungs pressing against unfamiliar softness higher up. The waistband of the pants dug slightly into the new inward curve above his hips, a sensation both alien and inexplicably right.

His fingers crept up to trace the neckline of his shirt, hovering where the fabric gaped to reveal smooth skin that had been rough with stubble yesterday. The absence of his Adam's apple still made his throat click when he swallowed. Every inhalation carried the faintest hint of something sweet—not perfume, just his own scent changed, mingling with Kayla's shampoo in his hair. He lifted a blonde strand between two fingers, marveling at how it caught the dawn light filtering through his curtains. It was like seeing color for the first time.

A soft knock at the door startled him. Kayla's voice came through, hushed but vibrating with barely contained energy. "Tyler? You awake?" The doorknob turned before he could answer, revealing his sister already dressed in leggings and an oversized sweatshirt, her hair piled messily atop her head. She froze mid-step, her eyes widening as they raked over him from head to toe. "Oh," she breathed, the syllable packed with too much emotion. "Oh wow."

"Hey sis" he said, his voice no longer his own.

"Right back at ya" she said, walking slowly into the room and dropping absently onto the bed next to him.

Kayla's fingers hovered just above Tyler's shoulder—close enough to feel body heat but not quite touching—as if he were a museum exhibit behind glass. "Your collarbones are perfect," she murmured, her clinical tone belied by the tremor in her fingers. "Like, magazine perfect. Mine always stick out weird when I slouch."

Kayla's fingers finally made contact, tracing the slope of Tyler's—no, *Taylor's*—collarbone with a reverence usually reserved for holy relics. Her touch lingered at the dip between bone and shoulder, mapping unfamiliar territory with the precision of an explorer claiming new land. "God," she breathed, "Gamma did you *right*."

Tyler sighed. "It's a bit much," he said softly.

"Whelp, let big sis take a look" she said, taking charge.

Big sis by only 3 minutes but he didn't say that aloud.

Kayla's gaze swept over Tyler with the clinical detachment of a doctor conducting a physical—until her eyes caught on the subtle differences that made her breath hitch. Her fingers twitched as she cataloged each deviation from her own reflection: the softer arch of his brows, the slightly fuller lower lip, the way his eyelashes curled just a fraction more at the outer corners.

When her scrutiny dropped to his chest, her own shoulders lifted unconsciously in comparison. "You bitch!" she gasped, poking one of his new breasts. "What the hell is this?"

Tyler couldn't resist a playful remark of his own. "Looks like I'm the BIG sister now"

Kayla gasped dramatically before pushing him back onto the bed, straddling him as she pinned his wrists above his head—a move perfected through years of childhood wrestling matches. But now their bodies aligned differently, her knees sinking into the mattress on either side of his narrower hips. Her victorious grin faltered when she noticed his pajama top had ridden up, exposing a strip of smooth stomach where subtle abs were.

"You have a six pack" she said, smacking his belly.

"What?"

Kayla jabbed a finger into Tyler's stomach, her nail catching on the faint ridges beneath his—*her*—skin. "Gamma gave you *abs*?" Her voice cracked with betrayal. "I've been doing Pilates for three years and mine still look like a sad potato!" She leaned closer, her ponytail brushing his cheek as she inspected the unexpected musculature.

Tyler lifted his shirt slightly and looked. Sure enough, there was muscle tone there. He was just as shocked as his sister.

He wasn't exactly the most athletic guy around. After all, he did spend all his free time eating junk and gaming. He wasn't fat but he wasn't in shape either. He was lanky and tall, hardly someone fit for a gym.

"Get up," his sister ordered, crawling off the bed. "I need to see something"

Tyler barely had time to register the command before Kayla's fingers closed around his wrist, hauling him upright with surprising strength. The sudden movement sent his new center of gravity tilting dangerously—his hips swayed instinctively to compensate, a move so fluid it startled him more than the unexpected muscle tone.

As soon as he was on his feet, he saw it. He was still tall.

Kayla was about five foot six. He'd been five ten before and apparently he still was. So it turns out The Bug didn't mess with his height.

"This is so fucking unfair!" his sister fake pouted.

Kayla's hands planted firmly on Tyler's—*Taylor's*—hips as she spun him toward the full-length mirror on the back of his door. The morning light caught every new curve in high definition, turning his silhouette into something out of a fashion editorial. Her chin hooked over his shoulder, eyes darting between their reflections with forensic intensity. "Okay, objectively?" She poked his flat stomach again. "This is bullshit. You ate an entire pizza last night."

He stared. He had one of those Instagram bodies. Like one of those girls who filmed exercise videos on Tiktok.

No shit.

"Little Miss Hottie" Kayla squealed, playfully pinching his side.

Tyler flinched at the pinch, his skin buzzing where Kayla's fingers had touched—too sensitive, like every nerve ending had been scrubbed raw overnight. He stared at their reflection, the unfamiliar girl in the mirror mimicking his slack-jawed expression. Kayla's grin in the glass was borderline feral, her fingers already digging through the clutter on his dresser.

"Hopeless" she grumbled as she went for the door. "But I've got the perfect stretchy top for those melons"

Kayla barged back in without knocking, arms laden with fabric that spilled over her forearms like liquid neon. "Emergency intervention," she declared, dumping the pile onto Tyler's bed with the solemnity of a surgeon presenting a transplant organ. The stretchy top she'd mentioned slithered to the top of the heap—a buttery-soft thing in deep cobalt that caught the morning light like polished metal. Beneath it, the yoga pants coiled like a snake ready to strike, their high-waisted design screaming *athleisure* with a side of *we own your hips now*.

He groaned and looked at the shopping bag. "What's that?"

He was dreading what was inside.

Kayla upended the shopping bag onto Tyler's bed with the flourish of a magician revealing their grand finale. A cascade of pastel fabrics spilled out—lace-trimmed bralettes, seamless panties still tagged with price stickers, and something that looked suspiciously like shapewear. "Welcome to your new reality," she announced, plucking a mint-green bralette from the pile and dangling it from one finger like a trophy. "Because those," she pointed at his chest with her free hand, "require *infrastructure*."

He went pale. Of course it was bras and panties.

"Though minor miscalculation on my part" she said, holding up a bra that was clearly too small.

Kayla tossed the too-small bra over her shoulder with a theatrical sigh, then snatched up a pale pink bralette instead. "Okay, arms up," she ordered.

She gripped the end of his borrowed pj top---her top---and pulled it over his head before he could react. Instinctively his hands covered his new breasts.

Kayla rolled her eyes and batted Tyler’s hands away with the impatience of someone who’d seen it all before. "Oh please, we shared a womb—modesty died nine months before we were born." She stretched the bralette between her fingers with practiced ease, the fabric expanding like a slingshot. "Arms. Up. Unless you want these things swinging free all day?"

Tyler hesitated, his arms hovering awkwardly at his sides as Kayla brandished the pink bralette like a battle standard. The morning air prickled against his bare skin—cooler than he remembered, more sensitive in ways that made his stomach flip. "This is stupid," he muttered, but lifted his arms anyway, his shoulders curling inward instinctively.

Kayla's fingers brushed Tyler's ribs as she maneuvered the bralette into place, her touch clinical until she hit a ticklish spot that made him squawk. "Hold *still*," she hissed through laughter, looping the straps over his shoulders with the precision of someone who'd done this blindfolded since middle school. The elastic settled against his skin with a soft snap—strangely comforting despite the absurdity.

The bralette’s fabric hugged Tyler’s chest with an intimacy that made his ears burn. Kayla stepped back, appraising her handiwork with the critical eye of a sculptor inspecting wet clay. "Damn," she breathed, reaching out to adjust the left strap by a millimeter. "Gamma gave you *perky*. It's like you won the genetic lottery while I got stuck with Mom's sad pancakes."

Tyler groaned, not wanting to hear any of that.

The bralette's seams pressed unfamiliar lines into Tyler's skin as Kayla circled him like a fashion designer assessing a runway model. Her fingers suddenly pinched the fabric near his armpit, making him flinch. "Side boob spillage—totally normal for first-timers," she announced, as if diagnosing a common cold. Before he could protest, she'd hooked two fingers under the band and yanked it downward with a sharp *snap* that stung. "Band's supposed to sit *here*, dumbass. Not where your third rib used to be."

She then scrutinized the fit. "Small but we'll fix that later, should be fine for now".

"Where did you get this?" he asked, noticing the tag still on it.

"I went shopping for my little sis yesterday" she said as if it was the most normal thing in the world. She pulled the tag off. "Wasn't expecting you to be all mega melons though"

He flushed.

Kayla’s hands landed on Tyler’s shoulders with the force of a WWE wrestler, spinning him back toward the mirror before he could process the "mega melons" comment. The girl in the reflection blinked back at him—*her*—with Kayla’s bralette cutting a pale pink line across unfamiliar skin. Tyler’s fingers twitched toward the straps, then froze. It fits. Somehow, it *fit*.

"Drop those grungy boxers and put them on" she said as if she was a woman on a mission.

Tyler's fingers hovered at the waistband of his boxers—Kayla's impatient tapping against her thigh sounded like a metronome counting down to his humiliation. "Turn around," he muttered, kicking at a discarded sock near his foot.

"We're both girls now dumbass" she said, tossing the panties at him. "Hurry up"

The panties hit Tyler square in the chest—a scrap of lilac fabric that clung briefly before sliding down his torso like a surrender flag. He caught them reflexively, fingers sinking into the impossibly soft material.

Thankfully they were pretty plain and boy cut.

Tyler's fingers fumbled with the waistband of his boxers, the elastic snapping against his hips in a way that felt foreign now—too loose where it had once fit snugly. He shot Kayla a glare, but she just smirked, arms crossed, one foot tapping like she was timing him. He pulled them down and kicked them off.

"Tick-tock, sis. Unless you wanna rock the commando look?"

The panties slipped up Tyler's thighs with an unsettling ease, as if his body had been waiting for this exact moment to betray him completely. He yanked them into place, the elastic waistband settling just below the dip of his hips—an inch lower than Kayla wore hers, but already feeling more natural than his old boxers ever had. The fabric breathed differently against his skin, a whisper of belonging that made his stomach twist.

Kayla's grin widened as Tyler adjusted the waistband with tentative fingers. "See? Not so bad," she said, plucking at the lilac fabric with a triumphant flick. "Though we might need to size up—you're packing more back there than I accounted for." Her hands landed abruptly on his hips, turning him sideways toward the mirror. "Seriously, did Gamma give you *all* the good genes?"

Kayla’s fingers traced the curve of Tyler’s hipbone through the thin fabric of the panties, her touch feather-light but electric. "Look at this," she murmured, half to herself, dragging her fingertip along the newly pronounced dip where his waist narrowed before flaring into hips. "It’s like someone photoshopped you into existence."

He'd seen it.

Kayla shoved the stretchy top into Tyler's hands with the urgency of a bomb squad technician passing off a live grenade. "Put this on before I lose my mind," she ordered, fanning herself dramatically. "God gave you *those* and me *this*?" She gestured wildly between Tyler's chest and her own with exaggerated despair.

The stretchy top slithered over Tyler's arms like a second skin, the fabric clinging to his torso with terrifying accuracy. He tugged at the hem instinctively—it stopped just above his bellybutton, exposing a strip of smooth skin that made his stomach flip. "This is too small," he muttered, twisting to see his reflection.

Kayla snorted, flipping her ponytail over one shoulder. "That's the *point*, Einstein." She grabbed Tyler's wrists before he could yank the top down further, forcing his arms up in a sudden, mortifying stretch that made the fabric ride even higher. "Look at that waist!" she crowed, spinning him toward the mirror again. "You're literally built like a damn hourglass. Meanwhile I—" She broke off with a theatrical groan, pulling her sweatshirt taut across her own torso in comparison.

Kayla's fingers dug into Tyler's waist, measuring the span between hands with a hum of approval. "Twenty-four inches, easy," she declared, as if quantifying his femininity somehow made it more real. "Mom's gonna lose her shit when she sees you." Her grip shifted upward, tracing the slope of his ribs with clinical fascination. "Your bones are literally rearranged—how does that even *work*?"

He wish he knew. His was every guy's wet dream now.

The cobalt top clung to Tyler's new contours like liquid paint, highlighting every shift in musculature beneath the fabric. Kayla stepped back, hands on her hips, surveying him with the critical eye of a gallery curator assessing a new installation. "Okay, objectively?" She jabbed a finger at his exposed midriff. "This is bullshit. You inhaled a family-sized bag of Doritos last week."

Tyler's fingers twitched at the hem of the too-short top, desperate for more fabric that wasn't coming. "This feels illegal," he muttered, watching the cobalt material stretch taut across his chest with every breath.

"Wait until these" she said, holding up the yoga pants. "Get a hold of that ass!"

The yoga pants hit Tyler's chest with a soft *whump*—black fabric so thin he could practically see through it. Kayla bounced on her toes, her grin bordering on manic. "These bad boys have *memory*," she announced, as if that explained everything. "They'll remember your ass long after you take them off."

The yoga pants stretched between Tyler's fingers like alien skin, the fabric unnervingly cool against his palms. He turned them inside out, inspecting the seams with exaggerated suspicion. "These look like torture devices," he muttered, holding them up to the light where they shimmered faintly.

The yoga pants slid up Tyler's legs with disturbing ease, the fabric tightening around his thighs like a second skin before snapping into place at his waist with an audible *shhhk*. Kayla let out a choked noise halfway between a gasp and a scream. "Oh my *God*," she whispered, clutching her own hips as if physically pained.

Tyler rolled his eyes. "Not like I asked for this"

Kayla went quiet for a moment and then hugged him from behind. "I know and I'm really sorry..."

He sighed. "Again, not your fault"

"Well when I find the bitch who did do this to you, I'm busting her face!" she announced protectively.

Kayla's arms tightened around Tyler's waist, her chin digging into his shoulder blade as she peered over him at their reflection. The yoga pants did, in fact, "get ahold of that ass"—the high-waisted fabric sculpting his silhouette with an almost comical precision. "Seriously," she murmured, her breath warm against his neck, "whoever engineered Gamma had a *type*."

Engineered.

There was a lot of talk about that on the internet. A lot of people were convinced The Bug was some government experiment that got out of control. Even its official name---V36---sounded like something out of sci-fi movie. It didn't help that it had various strains too. It was all kinds of messed up and laced with paranoia.

Kayla smacked his butt. "I can't help with your shoes for now but seeing as you're not going anywhere for a month, that should be fine for now"

The thought of leaving the house, of showing everyone the new him, it was daunting. Though a small part of him was excited about the prospect. What's more, that feeling of climbing the walls had returned. He never used to feel that way but ever since his mother pulled them out of school days ago, he was feeling antsy. It felt amplified now. Almost like he could run a marathon or something crazy like that.

"Now then" his sister said, taking his arm and pulling him away from the mirror. "Let's go show Mom her new daughter"

The kitchen smelled of burnt toast and reheated coffee—their mother's signature "I was up all night worrying" breakfast. Tyler hesitated in the doorway, his fingers twisting the hem of Kayla's cobalt top into a nervous knot. Their mother's back was to them, her shoulders rigid beneath a rumpled cardigan as she stabbed at her phone with one finger.

Their mother's phone clattered onto the Formica countertop when Kayla cleared her throat. The slow pivot of her chair was a study in delayed reactions—first the creak of worn hinges, then the stiff turn of her shoulders, finally the upward tilt of her chin that brought Tyler's transformed body into her line of sight. Her coffee mug froze midway to her lips, the steam curling around fingers that had gone bone-white around the ceramic.

To say she was stunned was an after statement.

Kayla rushed forward, taking the mug from her mother's hand. "We don't want to break anymore tableware" she said, gently placing it on the table.

"Hi Mom" Tyler said with his new voice, giving her an awkward wave.

It was clear their mother was processing what she was seeing. She had a daughter and son before. It was easy, it was simple. When Kayla brought Tyler home that night and he looked like death, everything simple had vanished in a heartbeat. When Dr. Harris and Dr. Jones told her that her son had The Bug, it felt like half her life was gone. She wasn't able to process it. Even after seeing the first changes in Tyler yesterday, her mind convinced her it wasn't quite real. An illusion or a dream.

This was no illusion though.

There was no dream.

Standing before her in a blue top and black yoga pants was Tyler but not Tyler. The girl looked a lot like him but a bit like Kayla too.

"Tyler?" she gasped, dropping into one of the kitchen chairs. "You sure you're..."

He sat down in the chair next to her, taking her hands. "It's me, Mom. Still me"

She nodded. She'd been reading for days. She'd seen the stories. All those boys turning into airheads and things. She blinked and stared at this girl. She had Tyler's bleach blonde hair. She had Tyler's vibrant blue eyes. She also had Tyler's smile.

"Honey, you're beautiful," she said softly, gently touching his face.

"The word you're looking for is Hottie!" Kayla corrected proudly. "I mean you see her fucking abs, they're unreal!"

Tyler and his mother both rolled their eyes, used to Kayla's enthusiasm.

"You're sure you're ok?" she asked, still touching his face. "I saw that Jasmine girl on the news last night. Her poor family. Jason was a smart boy and she..."

"Is dumb as a box of rocks" Kayla added for her.

Their mother shot her a look but said nothing.

The kitchen clock ticked three times before their mother exhaled sharply, her fingers tightening around Tyler’s—no, *Taylor’s*—hands. "You still feel like my kid," she murmured, more to herself than to them. Her thumb brushed over Taylor’s knuckles, tracing the unfamiliar smoothness where calluses used to be.

Tyler was relieved. He was scared his mother might not be able to handle it. Like Jason's parents. Like so many other parents he'd read about online.

"So" he finally asked. "What happens now?"

"Now" his mother said. "We eat some breakfast then I have to make some phone calls." She paused and looked at him. "You are all...?"

"Yeah" he said, embarrassed.

Kayla took charge of breakfast, insisting they can now finally eat healthier. She set about immediately, surprising both their mother and Tyler. Neither knew she could actually cook and what she was cooking actually smelled real good to Tyler.

Kayla slid a plate across the breakfast table with the precision of a blackjack dealer—one perfectly poached egg, avocado slices fanned out like green poker chips, and a single piece of whole-grain toast cut diagonally.

"Am I on some weird diet?" he asked, looking at the food.

Kayla stabbed her fork toward Tyler's untouched avocado slices with the intensity of a prison warden enforcing meal compliance. "Gamma may have given you a metabolism cheat code, but we're not testing those limits with Pop-Tarts," she declared, flicking a crumb off his plate with surgical precision. Their mother's eyebrows climbed toward her hairline as Kayla nudged a glass of green sludge toward Tyler—something pulsing ominously with chia seeds.

Tyler poked at the suspiciously green smoothie with his spoon, watching a chia seed slowly emerge like a creature from the depths. "This looks like something that escaped from a lab," he muttered, glancing at Kayla's expectant face.

He reluctantly drank the sludge and ate what was on his plate.

With breakfast over, the twins cleared the plates while their mother made her calls.

******

The doorbell chimed at precisely 8:17 AM—a crisp, bureaucratic sound that made Tyler's stomach lurch. Through the peephole, Dr. Jones' familiar salt-and-pepper bun was visible, flanked by two broad-shouldered men whose identical navy suits screamed *federal agent* louder than any badge ever could. One adjusted his sunglasses despite the overcast sky while the other clutched a leather portfolio tight enough to crack the binding.

"Showtime," Kayla whispered, her fingers digging into Tyler's shoulder as their mother smoothed her cardigan with trembling hands before opening the door.

Dr. Jones stepped inside with clinical efficiency, her sensible flats leaving damp prints on the foyer tile. "Mrs. Carver," she nodded, then froze mid-stride when she spotted Tyler hovering behind the couch. Her medical bag hit the floor with a thud. "Oh. *Oh my.*" Her professional mask slipped just long enough for Tyler to see the calculations happening behind her eyes—weight distribution, hip-to-waist ratio, the subtle feminine cant of his stance. "Incredible," she murmured, retrieving her bag with slightly unsteady hands.

The two men in suits exchanged looks.

The taller one—Agent Something-with-an-R—flipped open his badge with practiced ease. "Ma'am, we'll need to verify containment protocols." His gaze flicked to Tyler's exposed midriff, then away just as fast. "Given the... rapid progression."

Agent R's stylus hovered over his tablet like a surgeon's scalpel—precise, impersonal, ready to cut Tyler's life into neat bureaucratic segments. "Standard V63 protocol mandates thirty days of isolation post-transformation," he recited, eyes never leaving the screen.

Dr. Jones stepped forward. "We'll run some tests, make sure everything with her is functioning properly"

Their mother nodded, leading them all over to the living room couch.

The stethoscope's bell pressed against Tyler's chest like an accusation, cold enough to make him flinch. Dr. Jones' eyebrows knitted together as she listened—not to the heartbeat, but to the absence of something. "Remarkable," she murmured, sliding the stethoscope downward where ribs had reshaped themselves overnight. "Cardiac position matches female anatomical norms perfectly." The words landed like medical poetry Tyler hadn't consented to star in.

Kayla leaned over the back of the couch, her chin digging into Tyler's shoulder. "Bet her resting heart rate's better than mine too," she stage-whispered, earning a glare from Dr. Jones. The doctor's fingers prodded Tyler's throat next, checking the thyroid with clinical detachment that didn't quite mask her fascination. Tyler swallowed against the pressure, acutely aware of how the motion no longer caught against an Adam's apple that no longer existed.

The tourniquet snapped around Tyler's bicep with familiar discomfort—at least phlebotomy hadn't changed. Dr. Jones tapped the crook of his elbow with two fingers, frowning at the suddenly prominent veins. "Strain Gamma seems to have enhanced vascular visibility," she noted, labeling the first vial with a string of numbers that meant nothing to Tyler. The needle slid in effortlessly, drawing dark red that looked no different than it ever had. Except now it carried chromosomes Tyler hadn't woken up with yesterday.

"Can I ask a question?" asked Kayla and didn't wait for permission. "Why isn't she like Jasmine? You know all 'look at me' girly idiot?"

Agent R cleared his throat, suddenly finding his shoes fascinating. The shorter agent—Agent K, his badge read—shifted uncomfortably. "Different strains manifest differently," Dr. Jones cut in smoothly, pressing cotton to the puncture wound. "Strain Gamma appears to preserve baseline cognition while altering physiology." She peeled back the cotton to reveal unmarred skin—no bruising, no mark. Tyler blinked at the spot where the needle had been. Healing had never been that fast before.

"Isn't that what Jasmine had?" asked Kayla, confused.

"Same strain, different variant" Dr. Jones clarified.

Kayla snorted. "So Gamma's got versions now? What is this, software?"

Dr. Jones sighed, pressing her fingers against Tyler's wrist—his pulse point smoother now, veins tracing unfamiliar paths beneath skin that had softened overnight. The sphygmomanometer's cuff inflated with a hiss, squeezing his bicep where muscle had redistributed into something sleeker. "Variant Gamma-3, to be precise," she said, watching the mercury column drop. "Jasmine was Gamma-1." The numbers settled at 110/70—perfect for someone who'd supposedly spent last week mainlining energy drinks and pizza rolls. Dr. Jones' pen hesitated over her clipboard. "Your cardiovascular system appears to have... optimized itself."

Tyler flexed his fingers, watching tendons glide beneath skin that no longer bore the nicks and calluses from years of skateboarding. "Optimized," he repeated flatly. The word tasted clinical, sterile—like something ripped from a lab report rather than a description of his body.

Agent K cleared his throat, stepping forward with a tablet outstretched. "We'll need biometrics for the registry." His gaze flickered over Tyler's cobalt-clad torso with the wary fascination of someone assessing an exotic animal. "Facial recognition first." The tablet's camera flashed, capturing Tyler's bewildered expression—high cheekbones flushed pink, lips slightly parted in protest. The screen populated with side-by-side comparisons: Tyler Carver, male, Ridgewood High ID photo from September; and whatever the hell he was now.

Agent K’s tablet emitted a soft chime as the facial recognition software completed its analysis—98.7% match between Tyler’s old ID photo and the girl now fidgeting on the couch. A bureaucratic miracle, considering the circumstances. "Well," Agent R muttered, scrolling through the results, "at least we won’t need witness protection." His stylus tapped against the screen with rhythmic precision as he pulled up the National Identity Registry form. "Full name?"

Tyler opened his mouth, but Kayla beat him to it. "Taylor," she declared, draping herself over the back of the couch like a particularly possessive cat. "Taylor Elise Carver." The middle name was pure improvisation—something floral and undeniably feminine that made Tyler’s toes curl inside Kayla’s borrowed socks.

Tyler looked at his Mom. "Is that ok with you?"

His mother nodded. "The question should be is it ok with you?"

He shrugged. Kayla had actually been calling him that the last couple of days. He was kind of used to it by now. There was a subtle shift. He wasn't sure why or how but he could be Taylor. It was a nice name and he---no she---needed to get used to it.

"Taylor Elise Carver" she said aloud. "It's nice."

"Perfect!" Kayla clapped her hands, already mentally planning the monogrammed towels.

Agent K's stylus hovered over the tablet's touchscreen. "Date of birth remains unchanged?" The question landed awkwardly—as if unsure whether Tyler's transformation warranted a new birthday.

Dr. Jones intercepted smoothly. "Biological age aligns with chronological records." She flipped through Tyler's—no, *Taylor's*—medical file, her pen circling a hemoglobin value. "Remarkably stable vitals considering the..." Her gesture encompassed Taylor's entire body, the unspoken *complete cellular overhaul* hanging in the air.

Taylor watched as Agent R tapped his earpiece, murmuring codes into the microphone. A printer hummed to life in the kitchen, spitting out crisp sheets that smelled of government-issue toner. Birth certificate. Social security card. Even a provisional driver's license featuring Taylor's bewildered new face—already updated with Ridgewood High's automated photo system. The efficiency was terrifying.

"You'll receive permanent documents after isolation," Agent R said, sliding the papers into a thick envelope. His eyes flicked to Taylor's midsection where Kayla's cobalt top rode up slightly. "Assuming no... complications."

Kayla snorted. "Unless Gamma 4.0 drops next week." She draped herself over Taylor's shoulders, fingers teasing the ends of her twin's newly silky hair. "Think they'll make you fill out another W-9 if you grow wings?"

No one laughed.

Agent K cleared his throat and tapped his tablet. A holographic keyboard materialized above the screen. "We need to establish baseline preferences for your federal profile." His tone suggested this was as routine as renewing a library card. "Hobbies?"

Taylor shrugged. "Well it was gaming but..."

Kayla's face lit up. "But what?!"

"But it's like I'm suddenly losing interest in it" she said, not sure why.

Kayla fist pumped the air. "YES!"

Agent K’s stylus hesitated midair. "Hobbies?" he repeated, glancing between Taylor’s slumped shoulders and Kayla’s triumphant grin. The tablet’s holographic keyboard flickered like a dying firefly.

"I don't know," Taylor admitted with a sigh.

Agent K's stylus hovered over the holographic form, waiting for an answer that wouldn't come. The silence stretched until Dr. Jones cleared her throat. "Common side effect," she murmured, tapping her tablet. "Gamma recipients often report shifts in interests aligning with their new physiology."

"Well" Kayla was enthusiastic again. "We'll just have to find her some new ones!"

Taylor could see the wheels in her sister's head turning. She knew that look. Nothing good was going to come from this.

"We need to do some physical exercises now" Dr. Jones announced. "The CDC wants to understand what Taylor can handle"

"Our Dad has an exercise room set up in the basement" Kayla happily informed them.

The basement stairs creaked underfoot as Kayla led the procession downward—Agent R's polished oxfords, Dr. Jones' sensible flats, and Taylor's hesitant bare feet padding across the worn oak steps. The air grew cooler, tinged with the faint metallic tang of disuse and the ghost of their father's aftershave lingering in the corners. Motion-activated fluorescents flickered to life, illuminating a space caught between gymnasium and time capsule.

Taylor's toes curled against the rubberized flooring as she took in the room—racked dumbbells gleaming like chrome soldiers, a treadmill hibernating beneath a dust cover, their father's faded Green Bay Packers towel still draped over the weight bench. The mirror spanning the far wall reflected back a scene that didn't belong: a girl who looked like Kayla's clone standing where Tyler used to deadlift. A single cobweb trembled between the ceiling-mounted pull-up bar and the exposed ductwork.

"Daddy doesn't use it much anymore because of all his business traveling," Kayla said, walking over to the cabinet on the wall. "There are some yoga mats in here though"

"We won't need those," Agent R grunted. He pointed to the treadmill. "That on the other hand".

Kayla flipped the dust cover off with dramatic flair, revealing a top-of-the-line model with more buttons than a spaceship console. "Zero to fifteen percent incline," she bragged, tapping the display. "Dad splurged after his cholesterol scare."

The treadmill's belt hummed to life beneath Taylor's bare feet, the sudden motion making her stumble backward into Agent R's waiting hands. "Easy," he muttered, steadying her with the detached professionalism of a flight attendant demonstrating seatbelts. The speed increased incrementally—5 mph, then 6, then 7—yet Taylor's breathing remained eerily steady, her ponytail swaying like a metronome set to some internal rhythm Gamma had installed.

Dr. Jones' tablet nearly slipped from her grip when the display hit 9 mph. "Her gait..." she murmured, watching Taylor's hips adjust fluidly to the increasing speed. No wasted motion, no awkward compensation—just seamless biomechanics that made Kayla's jogging form look like a toddler's first steps.

Taylor felt on exhilarated as she ran.

This was it. This was the itch she'd been feeling before.

The treadmill's digital display blinked 10.2 mph—a speed Taylor had never sustained for more than thirty seconds in PE class—yet her lungs weren’t burning. Her legs moved with unnatural precision, each stride calibrated to some internal algorithm that made running feel like gliding. Across the room, Kayla’s jaw hung slightly open, her fingers frozen mid-air where she’d been adjusting her ponytail.

Agent R's grip tightened on the treadmill's emergency stop cord, his knuckles whitening as Taylor's pace climbed to 11.5 mph without breaking a sweat. The machine whined in protest, its motor struggling to keep up with her effortless strides. Dr. Jones' tablet chimed—Taylor's heart rate holding steady at 122 bpm, lower than Kayla's resting pulse despite the exertion.

"She's beaten the record already" Agent R mumbled to the doctor.

The treadmill's emergency stop cord snapped taut in Agent R's fist, jerking the belt to a sudden halt that should have sent Taylor sprawling—except her knees bent effortlessly, absorbing the momentum like coiled springs. She stood there panting, not from exhaustion, but from the sheer exhilaration thrumming through her Gamma-enhanced muscles. Across the basement, Kayla's water bottle hit the floor with a plastic clatter.

"This virus is incredible" Dr. Jones gasped, losing her composure again.

"Let's move on," Agent R announced.

Taylor barely had time to catch her breath before Agent K gestured toward the pull-up bar mounted between exposed ceiling joists. The metal gleamed dully under the fluorescents, its surface pitted from years of their father's sporadic workouts. Taylor flexed her fingers—smooth now, lacking the calluses that used to protect his palms from gym equipment—and approached dread curled in her stomach stomach.

Kayla bounced on her toes behind them. "Dad did twenty-seven last Thanksgiving," she volunteered, as if this were some sacred family record.

Agent R's tablet hovered expectantly. Taylor jumped, grabbing the bar with hands that felt too small, too soft. She expected the familiar burn of shoulder muscles straining—but her body moved differently now. Her elbows bent smoothly, chin clearing the bar without the usual grunt of effort. Three. Six. Nine. The numbers ticked upward in Agent R's monotone count while Taylor's arms pumped mechanically, like pistons in an engine she didn't know how to operate.

"Twenty-eight," Agent R announced as Taylor dropped down, not even winded. Kayla's mouth formed a perfect 'O' behind her.

They went through push-ups, sit ups and jumping jacks. None of them winded her.

Agent R was about to suggest free weights when Dr. Jones cut him off. "Its going to have to wait, I still need to take her measurements and we're running out of time"

The measuring tape snaked around Taylor's ribcage with clinical precision, its cold metal tip brushing the newly sensitive skin beneath her sports bra. Dr. Jones' fingers trembled slightly as she noted the number—28 inches, a measurement that made Kayla groan dramatically from her perch on the weight bench. "Gamma cheats," she muttered, twisting a strand of hair around her finger.

The measuring tape scraped against Taylor's spine as Dr. Jones stretched it vertically from floor to crown. "Five foot ten," she announced, sounding almost disappointed—as if Gamma's genetic wizardry had somehow fallen short by not granting supermodel height.

Its what she and Kayla had figured out in the bedroom this morning, so that didn't surprised her.

What did was her weight.

"135" Dr. Jones announced after Taylor stepped off the scale. The doctor was satisfied. "Given your height and current muscle mass, that's ideal"

She marked it all down, including some of the other misc. measuring she took.

They all returned upstairs where they found Agent K in kitchen drinking a cup of coffee with their mother.

"We're done here" Dr. Jones announced then she turned to Taylor. "We'll send a package in the next few days. There should be some clothing and other essentials".

Taylor nodded. "Thanks".

"I can get her those" huffed Kayla, arms crossed.

The front door clicked shut behind Dr. Jones and the agents, leaving the house suspended in sudden silence. Taylor stared at her reflection in the hallway mirror—still not quite believing the girl staring back was her. Kayla's yoga pants clung to her hips in a way that felt foreign yet... right.

Kayla grabbed her hand. "Now it's my turn" She announced, pulling Taylor toward the stairs.

"Turn for what?" Taylor asked, scared.

Nothing good ever came when Kayla dragged her off.

"Girl lessons, duh" she said, dragging her new sister up the stairs.

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF

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Author's Note:We are here at least, the end of this story. Its been a lot of fun. I'd really like to thank everyone for their reactions to this, it was a lot of fun to do. I appreciate any kind of feedback or comments that people might have :).
 

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5.

Kayla's bedroom was a controlled explosion of femininity that somehow managed to avoid being tacky—probably because she'd spent sixteen years refining the aesthetic. The walls were a soft blush pink, something muted and sophisticated. A gallery wall above the dresser displayed framed concert tickets, Polaroids of Kayla with friends, and one embarrassing middle school dance photo that Taylor vaguely remembered being forced into a suit for. The vanity was a battlefield of half-open compacts and lip gloss tubes, its mirror smudged with fingerprints where Kayla had leaned in too close to apply eyeliner.

The queen-sized bed dominated the space, its fluffy white comforter piled high with decorative pillows in varying shades of cream and rose. Taylor knew without asking that Kayla actually slept with exactly one pillow—the rest got tossed to the floor every night in a ritual their mother had given up fighting years ago. Beside the bed, an overstuffed chair overflowed with discarded outfits from that morning's wardrobe crisis.

"What are we doing here?" Taylor asked from the doorway.

Kayla took her hands, dragging her over to the vanity.

Kayla spun Taylor toward the vanity mirror with a flourish, pressing her shoulders down until she sat. "Phase one," she announced, snapping open a makeup case that smelled of pressed powders and teenage desperation. "Basic survival skills." Her fingers danced over palettes like a concert pianist—burgundy here, champagne there—selecting colors with the precision of a bomb technician.

Taylor recoiled as her sister brandished an eyeliner pencil like a scalpel. "You're not tattooing me."

"Relax, it's just winged liner." Kayla's knee dug into Taylor's thigh as she leaned in, her breath warm against Taylor's cheek. "Unless you want to look like a middle schooler who got into her mom's Clinique bag." The pencil touched Taylor's lash line—a sensation both alien and oddly familiar, like remembering a language she'd never learned.

The mirror reflected Kayla's focused frown, her tongue poking between her teeth the way it did during chemistry exams. Taylor watched her own face transform stroke by stroke—the subtle arch of her brows darkened, lips blotted with a stain that tasted like artificial cherries. Gamma's work became somehow more real under Kayla's ministrations, the girl in the glass settling into her features like they'd always been hers.

Kayla stepped back from the vanity, her fingers twitching near Taylor's face like she wanted to tweak something but couldn't find a flaw. "Holy shit," she breathed, her usual bravado cracking for once. The makeup wasn't dramatic—just enough to accentuate Gamma's handiwork—but the transformation was startling nonetheless. Taylor looked like Kayla's polished doppelganger, the subtle contouring making her cheekbones look sharper, her lips fuller, her eyes somehow brighter.

Kayla snapped a picture. "For the folder" she said and a second later Taylor's phone binged. "One for your Insta too"

"I don't have an Insta" she admitted.

"Not yet sis" Kayla giggled.

Taylor sighed. She had to admit though, the makeup was amazing. For a fleeting moment, she couldn't help but wonder if she could do that too?

Taylor's own phone binged again. A text from Benny:

*You Alive Still, Bro?*

Taylor cursed, realizing she forgot to update him.

"Kay, I gotta talk to Benny" she said, getting up from the chair.

Kayla waved her off. "We'll finish this later, Tay."

Taylor groaned, suddenly realizing why Kayla had insisted on calling her "Taylor".

Kay and Tay.

Shit.

She left her sister's room, moving back toward her own as she called Benny.

"Yo, you all girly now?" asked Benny when he answered.

Taylor rolled her eyes. "Hey to you too".

"Dude, you sound like a chick!" Benny gasped.

"Dude, I am a chick" Taylor said, annoyed.

The silence on Benny's end stretched just a beat too long. Taylor could practically hear the gears grinding in his head through the phone. "So like..." Benny cleared his throat. ""Wait, you actually—"

"They said 48 hours. I'm all girl as of this morning" Taylor explained.

"No shit" Benny said softly.

Benny’s silence stretched long enough that Taylor could hear the faint hum of his gaming PC in the background. Finally, he exhaled sharply. "So you like Kayla's full twin now?"

|"One sec" she said, sending him the pic Kayla had taken of her only minutes ago.

Benny's phone clattered to his desk. Taylor heard the distant thump followed by static-filled cursing. "No fucking way," he whispered when he came back on the line. "That's actually you?"

"I'm a Hottie, right?" he said, mimicking Kayla's voice and tone.

Benny’s breath hitched. “Dude. *Dude.* You look like—holy shit.” The line crackled with his stunned silence before he blurted, “You’re hotter than Kayla!”

She wasn't expecting that.

"Dude" she hissed.

Benny chuckled. "I'm sorry Ty" he said then quickly. "Is it still Tyler?"

"Taylor now" she said, still annoyed that Kayla had tricked her into it.

Benny snorted. "Tay and Kay"

"Bite me" she snapped.

"Gladly"

"Ewww".

Benny laughed. "I call it how I see it"

Taylor felt uncomfortable. "I'm hanging up now"

She ended the call then dialed Callie's number. Callie answered on the second ring.

"Tyler?" her voice was unsure, hopeful.

"Hey Cal" she said, her voice unsure but ready.

Callie sucked in a breath. "You sound a bit like Kayla"

"I look a bit like her too" She bit her lip then sent Callie the photo.

Callie's phone clattered against her desk. Taylor heard a muffled gasp, followed by three seconds of dead air before Callie whispered, "Oh my god." The line clicked—Callie had switched to video. Taylor hesitated, then accepted, watching as Callie's pixelated face morphed from shock to something dangerously close to awe.

"Wow," Callie said, staring. "Kayla, did your makeup?"

"Yeah" Taylor said, unsure about the video call but too late to back out now. "I look ok?"

"You look beautiful," Callie blurted out before she could stop herself.

Taylor blushed.

Callie's fingertips hovered near her screen like she wanted to touch Taylor's image. "So...what do I call you now?"

"Taylor".

Callie giggled. "It's really cute. I like it"

Taylor was strangely relieved. Not just that Callie thought he was cute but also because she still made his stomach flutter. He was scared when things changed and he became a girl, that's he'd stop having a crush on her. Staring at her now---seeing her cute smile---he was glad that wasn't the case.

"You ok?" Callie asked when she realized Taylor wasn't talking.

Taylor blinked. "Yeah and I'm better than good too" She took a deep breath. "I'm happy to say I'm not a Jasmine"

He saw the visible relief on Callie's face.

"I was so scared," Callie said, tearing up slightly.

"Hey it's ok, I'm me" Taylor reassured her. "Well, except I think I'm a gym girl now."

"What?" Callie asked, laughing through her tears.

Taylor sucked in a breath. "I've got abs, Cal. The CDC was here earlier too and I did all this shit without breaking a sweat" She bit her lip. "I want to run too."

Callie's eyes sparkled through the pixelated screen. "Wait—you *want* to run? Like, voluntarily?" She leaned closer, her forehead nearly touching her camera. "You sure you're still not sick?"

Taylor stuck out her tongue. Callie giggled.

She went on to explain the whole of her day to Callie so far. The two of them talked for well over two hours. First it was about Taylor's day then it turned into Callie's day. Callie explained how her parents finally let her go back to school.

"Do they know about me yet?" Taylor asked, concerned.

She nodded. "It was on the news. The CDC also announced that it seems The Bug has moved. With you, Jas and Henry---the last patient---in isolation, there's no more worry."

"They're sure?" she asked, still scared that Callie or Kayla would get sick.

"There hasn't been any new outbreaks since you 3 days ago" Callie clarified. "We're wearing masks, getting regular blood screenings. They're being cautious but they're pretty certain its gone"

She was relieved to hear it.

Now she would just have to survive her new life.

That night, their Dad finally returned home. Taylor and Kayla were watching some mushy rom com that Taylor had no interest in. Kayla was in the kitchen making popcorn when the front door opened.

At first their father thought Taylor was Kayla: "Sweetheart" he said, tired. "I love what you've done with your hair"

Taylor was stunned, not having seen her father in actual months.

Their father was more stunned when Kayla walked out of the kitchen with the popcorn. "Oh hey Daddy" she said casually, dropping onto the couch. "This is Taylor, your new daughter"

And that's how Taylor's reunion with her father went.

Their mother met him at the door with a glass of wine. "Welcome to the Fun House" she said with a laugh.

The rest of the night it was all pretty damn awkward. Taylor felt her father staring at her all night but he didn't say one word to her.

The next morning, Taylor woke to find Kayla perched on the edge of her bed like a manic pixie drill sergeant, already dressed in athleisure wear with a full face of makeup. "Wakey wakey," she announced, tossing a pastel pink sports bra at Taylor's face. "Morning routines are sacred."

Kayla had done some more shopping for her last night. She updated Taylor's bra selection and bought her some clothes that fit her new body properly.

Taylor groaned into her pillow—it smelled faintly of the vanilla-scented shampoo Kayla had forced her to use last night—before grudgingly pulling the bra on. The fabric stretched over her chest with unfamiliar resistance, the snug fit simultaneously comforting and alien. At least this one fit.

"Today's lesson?" Kayla flourished a curling wand like Excalibur. "Basic maintenance."

Taylor eyed the contraption warily. "That looks like a medieval torture device."

"It will be if you don't hold still." Kayla plugged it in with a decisive click. "Gamma gave you the hair, but I'm giving you the skills to not look like you styled it with a weed whacker."

That's how it began and continued.

For the next week, every time she woke, Kayla was there waiting.

Kayla's tutoring sessions unfolded with military precision—each morning began with skincare routines that felt more like chemical warfare, followed by hair styling tutorials where Taylor learned the difference between a beach wave and a "I slept in a dumpster" wave. By day three, she could French braid without cursing, though Kayla still had to intervene when she accidentally tangled half her hair in the straightener.

The strangest part wasn't the techniques—it was how quickly her hands adapted. The Bug had rewired her muscle memory along with everything else. Her fingers automatically twisted strands into perfect spirals, her wrists pivoted at just the right angle to blend eyeshadow. Sometimes Taylor would catch herself humming along to Kayla's playlist while flat-ironing her bangs, moving with an ease that should've taken years to develop.

"You're cheating," Kayla accused during their fourth makeup session, watching Taylor nail winged liner on the first try. She poked Taylor's ribcage. "Gamma gave you built-in tutorials or something?"

Taylor grunted. "I'm a fast study" she admitted.

It was only half right. She had a lot of focus now, more than she ever did as Tyler. What's more, once she seemed to learn something now, she picked up almost instantly.

Kayla huffed, tossing her a tube of mascara. "Try this without stabbing your eye out."

Taylor caught it effortlessly—another perk of Gamma's enhancements—her fingers moving with uncanny precision as she unscrewed the cap. The wand glided over her lashes in smooth strokes, each movement perfectly mirrored from Kayla's earlier demonstration. The mirror reflected lashes so thick and dark they looked photoshopped.

This became their week. Girl Lessons in the morning, then lunch. Followed by more Girl Lessons up to dinner. It was strange and exciting all at once. Better than that was her new relationship with Kayla. They were closer than ever now. Taylor spent less and less time in her room and more time with Kayla, just doing "stuff".

Her nights were spent texting Callie, dodging Benny's pervy texts and setting up her new socials that Kayla insisted she do. They still had to be private though, per the agreement their mother made with the government. Full media blackout until she was officially back at school. That meant no reporters, no interviews but also no TikTok, Instagram or Snapchat.

Everything was going pretty smoothly except Taylor's relationship with her father. They didn't talk and when he was around, it was awkward.

When the second week of her isolation started, Kayla did more of the same but added other little annoyances.

Taylor woke to the smell of jasmine-scented candles—Kayla’s newest obsession—and the sight of her sister contorted into what looked like a human pretzel on the lavender yoga mat they’d dragged into Taylor’s room. "Rise and shine, Sleeping Beauty," Kayla chirped, her voice strained from holding some impossible pose. "Today we unlock your chakras."

Taylor groaned, pulling a pillow over her face. The fabric smelled like the rosewater toner Kayla had spritzed on her before bed. "It’s seven AM."

"Perfect time for sun salutations," Kayla said, unfurling herself with unnatural grace. She tossed another mat at Taylor’s legs. "Gamma gave you flexibility. Let’s not waste it."

Invoking "Gamma this" and "Gamma that" was starting to get on her nerves but Kayla wouldn't stop.

With yoga now added to her daily routine, she started to feel more flexible as well.

Week 2 dragged on as much as the first but with more to do.

Taylor's phone buzzed with an incoming call mid-downward dog, nearly sending her face-first into the yoga mat. Kayla made an exasperated noise as Taylor wobbled upright, nearly tripping over her own leggings—still not used to the way fabric clung to her hips now—to grab the device. Callie's name flashed on the screen.

Taylor fumbled with the phone, her Gamma-enhanced reflexes the only thing preventing it from smacking her in the face. "Hey Cal," she panted, wiping sweat from her brow with the back of her hand—a gesture that made Kayla roll her eyes and mime proper lady-like blotting with an imaginary handkerchief.

"It's official, no more Bug in Ridgewood" Callie announced with glee. "So when are you officially coming back to school?"

Taylor sighed. "I have one more week"

She could hear the disappointment in Callie's sigh. "I really want to see you, you know?"

There was definitely something unspoken there. Taylor thought Callie was just being her friend like usual but something shifted. That something was with Taylor for years but he was certain Callie had never truly felt that way. Both of them were aware of it but neither of them were brave enough to do anything about it.

The call ended with Callie's unspoken question lingering in the air like static. Taylor stared at her phone screen—now displaying the lock screen photo Kayla had sneakily changed to a mortifying close-up of their matching manicures—until Kayla's socked foot prodded her thigh.

The socked foot jabbed Taylor again. "Earth to Gamma Girl," Kayla said, curling her toes against Taylor's leggings. "You just did the whole staring-into-space-with-a-stupid-smile thing. Callie say something good?"

"Nope, just the usual," Taylor said, turning away.

"You're blushing".

The third week of isolation began with Kayla dumping a Sephora bag onto Taylor's bed at dawn—contents spilling out in a cacophony of plastic-wrapped palettes and jingling brushes. "Advanced warfare," Kayla declared, plucking a liquid eyeliner pen from the pile like Excalibur. Taylor groaned into her pillow, which now permanently smelled of Kayla's vanilla-chai body mist from their nightly skincare routines.

The eyeliner pen hovered dangerously close to Taylor's waterline as Kayla demonstrated the "puppy dog" technique for the third time that morning. "Hold still," Kayla murmured, her tongue poking out in concentration. Taylor blinked—bad move—and felt the cold sting of liquid liner where it shouldn't be. "Dammit, Tay!"

"Sorry," Taylor muttered, dabbing at the smudge with a cotton swab. Her reflection in the vanity mirror showed raccoon eyes that would make a punk rocker proud. Three weeks of this, and she still couldn't nail eyeliner. Meanwhile, her Gamma-enhanced muscles could do one-handed pushups without breaking a sweat. Life wasn't fair.

Kayla snatched the liner back with a huff. "Let's switch to theory." She pulled up a YouTube tutorial on contouring—some beauty guru with cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass. Taylor's phone buzzed. Another text from Benny: *u gonna wear a skirt when u come back?* She rolled her eyes so hard Kayla noticed.

"Problem?" Kayla asked, eyebrow arched.

"Benny being Benny." Taylor turned her screen to show the message.

Kayla grinned. "Well I do have the cutest one that would work with those killer legs of yours"

Taylor grunted. "I told you, Kay, I'm not ready for that"

Her sister pouted but dropped it.

Things continued like that for another few days. Girl Lessons, online school, more Girl Lessons. Then came the day Taylor had been waiting for—her last day of isolation.

The dining room smelled like garlic butter and nostalgia—a combination Taylor hadn’t realized she missed until their father awkwardly placed the takeout containers in front of her with a stiff nod. "Your usual," he muttered, sliding the Styrofoam clamshell across the table like it might explode. The grease-stained container held the last meal she'd ever eaten as Tyler: extra-spicy General Tso’s chicken, the kind that made her chug milk halfway through.

Kayla snorted, poking at her own salad with surgical precision. "Way to commemorate the apocalypse, Dad." Their mother shot her a warning look, but Taylor caught the twitch of her lips. The whole scene was bizarrely normal—if you ignored the fact that Taylor was sitting there in a cropped hoodie that showed off her newly acquired midriff, her hair styled in perfect beach waves courtesy of Kayla’s relentless tutorials.

Taylor hesitated before popping open the container, the steam carrying memories of soccer team dinners and late-night cram sessions. She’d eaten this exact meal a hundred times before, but never with these hands—never with nails painted ballet-slipper pink, never with wrists that looked too delicate to belong to someone who could out-bench their football team. The first bite was unexpectedly painful in its familiarity, the heat flooding her mouth just like always. Except now it made her eyes water in a way that had Kayla tossing her a napkin with an exasperated, "Blot, don’t wipe."

"So excited about school next week?" Their father asked, trying small talk.

The man was struggling with all of this.

Taylor shrugged. "I'm pretty sure its going to be the same old school like usual."

Kayla snorted. "As if"

"What does that mean?" asked Taylor, scared that something new might happen.

Kayla smirked. "It means you're hot now, Tay. People are going to notice"

Taylor groaned as she stabbed at her General Tso’s chicken with chopsticks that suddenly felt too delicate in her hands. The takeout celebration dinner was supposed to feel normal—their parents had even dimmed the dining room lights like it was some fancy restaurant instead of their cramped suburban home. But nothing about tonight was normal, not with Dad avoiding eye contact every time Taylor’s newly manicured fingers reached for another egg roll, not with Mom pretending not to notice when Taylor instinctively adjusted her bra strap through the thin fabric of her hoodie.

This was their new normal now.

On Saturday morning, Taylor's mother silently entered her room. She expected to find her new daughter still asleep but Taylor was sitting on the edge of the bed.

"Dr. Jones called, your isolation has been lifted. You're free to leave the house if you'd like".

Taylor's face lit up. "Seriously?" Her mother nodded, she squealed.

Finally, she'd be able to run without the stupid treadmill.

Taylor's fingers trembled as she tied the laces of her running shoes—brand new neon pink Nikes Kayla had bought her the other day. The morning air through her cracked bedroom window carried the scent of wet pavement and impending rain, making her lungs ache with the need to move. She paused at the full-length mirror Kayla had installed last week, taking in the stranger staring back: leggings hugging unfamiliar muscle definition, a cropped sports bra revealing smooth skin where her new abs were on full display.

There was nothing boy about her now.

Tyler was gone. She'd mourn him but lately, she'd felt a lot more confident and full of energy. She never realized how lonely and lazy her old life had been.

The front door creaked open with the gravitas of a prison gate—Taylor hesitated on the threshold, her neon pink shoelaces catching sunlight like traffic cones. Three weeks of isolation had rewired her perception of air itself; the suburban morning smelled impossibly green, asphalt still damp from overnight rain exhaling petrichor that prickled her enhanced senses. Her first step onto the porch felt like stepping onto the moon.

She walked to the end of the driveway, limbering up.

Their elderly neighbor, Mrs. Finch, was getting her mail from the box.

"Morning Mrs. Finch" she said cheerfully.

"Oh morning, Kayla dear, I haven't see you in weeks. Not since poor Tyler got sick" She paused. "How is he?"

Taylor was embarrassed and smiled. "Actually, I'm Tyler ma'am".

Mrs. Finch's bifocals slid down her nose as she squinted at Taylor. The silence stretched long enough for a leaf to flutter between them. "Oh," she finally said, adjusting her cardigan with trembling hands. "Well. You look... just like your sister."

Taylor laughed. "Well we are twins."

The old woman nodded, turned and started back toward her house.

Taylor started her run.

The pavement blurred beneath Taylor's neon shoes as she lapped the block twice—testing Gamma's limits with each stride that sent her flying past mailboxes in a pink streak. Her lungs burned sweetly, not from exhaustion but from the sheer joy of movement after weeks of confinement. On the third pass, her feet pivoted without conscious thought, carrying her down the cul-de-sac toward Callie's butter-yellow colonial before her brain could protest.

Taylor slowed to a walk as the house came into view, suddenly aware of her sweat-damp sports bra and the way her ponytail had come half-undone during the run. Callie's bedroom curtains were still drawn—of course they were, it was barely 8 AM on a Saturday—but the kitchen light glowed warm behind the bay window. Taylor hovered at the edge of the driveway, torn between knocking and bolting back home like a startled deer.

The decision was made for her when the front door swung open. Callie's mom nearly dropped her coffee mug at the sight of Taylor panting on her porch. "Jesus—" She caught herself, eyes darting from Taylor's Gamma-enhanced curves to the faint remnants of Tyler's features in her face. "Taylor? Honey, you look..."

"Hi Mrs. M" she said, waving awkwardly.

There was a squeal from somewhere in the house, someone made dashing toward them. A moment, Callie leapt past her mother, throwing her arms around Taylor's neck.

Callie's bare feet skidded on the hardwood as she collided with Taylor, the impact sending them both stumbling backward onto the dew-damp welcome mat. Taylor instinctively wrapped her arms around Callie's waist—her Gamma-enhanced reflexes the only thing preventing them from toppling over—and suddenly she was hyperaware of the warmth of Callie's sleep-rumpled tank top against her bare midriff, the strawberry shampoo scent of her hair tickling Taylor's nose.

"You're here" Callie gasped. "You're out then? No more lock down?"

Taylor laughed. "Bug free".

Callie's fingers dug into Taylor's shoulders like she might evaporate if she let go. "Mom, can Taylor stay for breakfast?" The words tumbled out in a rush, her breath warm against Taylor's collarbone. Mrs. M's gaze flickered between them—lingering on how Callie's thumbs brushed the exposed skin above Taylor's sports bra—before nodding slowly.

Callie let go of her neck but grabbed her hand and led her into the house toward the kitchen. Mr. M was already sitting at the table, his toast halfway to his mouth when he saw Taylor.

"Taylor, I assume?" he asked, watching both the girls like a hawk.

"It is now, sir" she said as Callie dragged her to a seat.

The syrup bottle hovered between them like an interrogation lamp. Mr. M poured another precise spiral onto his pancakes while studying Taylor over the rim of his glasses. "So," he said, tapping the spatula against the griddle, "the virus thing. Did it... hurt?"

Callie kicked him under the table. "Dad!"

"No sir," Taylor explained. "I was asleep when they happened. When I woke up both days, the changes were done"

Taylor watched Mrs. M's knuckles whiten around her coffee mug. "And your parents—how are they handling..." Her gaze flicked to Taylor's manicured nails drumming against the maple tabletop.

"Mom's adjusting," Taylor said carefully, tracing the wood grain with her fingertip. "Dad's... still working through it." The understatement burned her tongue worse than the General Tso’s chicken had last night.

Mr. M cleared his throat. "We saw the CDC bulletins. The..." His eyes darted to Taylor's collarbones peeking above her sports bra. "The physical changes are permanent?"

"Yep. Batting for the other team now" Taylor said with a chuckle.

"The better team" said Callie, giving Taylor's hand a gentle squeeze.

Mrs. M's spoon clinked against her cereal bowl. "What about school records? Birth certificate?" Her questions came rapid-fire, the same practical concerns Taylor's own mother had obsessed over during week two of isolation. "Do you still use the same social security number?"

Taylor shrugged. "Got a provisional ID last week. The government seems to be handling all of that."

Mr. M leaned forward, elbows sticking to the maple syrup stains on the table. "And physically...you feel alright?" His eyes darted to Callie's fingers interlaced with Taylor's, then quickly away. "No side effects?"

Taylor had to think about it. "I'm not as lazy as before" She waved at her outfit. "I was out running. It seems I'm pretty athletic now"

Callie grinned and squeezed her hand tighter. "That's insane."

Mrs. M cleared her throat. "And medically? Are you..." Her voice dropped. "Fully functional?"

Taylor blushed. She wasn't really sure how to answer that. She knew the answer from what Dr. Jones had told her but saying it aloud.

"Mom!" Callie chastized her mother. "And with that, interrogation is over. Taylor and I are going to my room now!"

Before any of them could say a thing, Callie grabbed her hand and pulled her from the kitchen.

"Keep the door wide open, young lady!" her father shouted but the two girls were already out of the kitchen.

Callie's bedroom door swung open with the faint creak Taylor remembered from childhood visits, but the space beyond had transformed into something entirely foreign. Posters of boy bands had been replaced with moody indie film prints, the twin bed upgraded to a queen with a wrought-iron frame that looked suspiciously adult. A vanity dominated the far wall, its surface cluttered with more makeup than Kayla owned—which Taylor hadn't thought possible. The air smelled like the vanilla candle flickering on the nightstand, layered with something citrusy from the diffuser humming in the corner.

Taylor noticed some Kpop posters as well.

Callie kicked the door shut with her heel—not quite closed enough to earn parental wrath, but enough to grant them the illusion of privacy. Taylor hovered near the bed, suddenly hyperaware of her own sweat-damp skin and the way her neon running shoes clashed violently with Callie's muted lavender bedroom decor.

"Its really nice" she said as Callie took her hand and sat down on the bed with her.

Callie bit her lip. "If I do something right now, will you freak out?"

Taylor's pulse thudded in her throat—she could feel it against her collarbone where Callie's fingers had brushed moments ago. The morning sunlight through Callie's curtains painted stripes across the comforter between them, highlighting the space where their knees almost touched. "Depends on the something," she managed, her voice sounding oddly high even to her own ears.

Callie's fingers twitched against the comforter before darting forward to hook around Taylor's pinky—a gesture so small it shouldn't have sent Taylor's heart ricocheting against her ribs. "Like this," Callie whispered, her thumb brushing Taylor's knuckle in a way that made the scar from Tyler's bike accident feel brand new.

Taylor's breath caught as Callie's pinky curled tighter around hers—a childish gesture that somehow felt more intimate than anything she'd experienced pre-Gamma. The morning sunlight caught the gold flecks in Callie's brown eyes, making her eyes look like amber trapped in honey.

"I want to kiss you so much right now" Callie found herself saying, catching them both off guard.

"Wait, what?" asked Taylor, surprised.

Callie bit her lip again. "You're absolutely gorgeous. I mean I've always had the tiniest bit of a crush on Kayla but you know, she's Kayla. But you, I liked Tyler a lot..." She paused, taking a deep breath. "And now..."

Taylor stopped Callie talking with her lips.

Callie's breath hitched against Taylor's mouth—a startled little gasp that tasted like maple syrup and morning toothpaste. The kiss lasted longer than she expected. Callie pulled away gently, a big smile on her face.

"That was so not like you" she said, brushing hair behind her ear.

"Sorry".

Taylor was certain she fucked up. She wasn't sure what happened but something inside of her told her to kiss Callie. She'd been scared about her sexual preferences for awhile now. Ever since she changed actually. She'd been doing some research online about it. A lot of Bug girls kept the same sexual preferences as before but some did start liking guys. Many of them ended up bisexual. She wasn't sure how things were going to turn out. She knew she'd been attracted to Callie as Tyler and after their "flirt calls" as Kayla called them, she was convinced she still felt the same.

Now she just confirmed it.

"I'm not mad," Callie finally said. "In fact, I kinda like this new, impulsive person you've become"

Callie leaned in and kissed her again. It was longer and more sensual than before.

Taylor melted into the second kiss. Callie's fingers tangled in the hair at Taylor's nape, the slight tug sending an electric jolt down her spine. When they finally broke apart, Taylor realized her hands had migrated to Callie's waist entirely on their own, thumbs brushing the sliver of warm skin between her sleep shorts and cropped tank top.

"If we don't stop, we might go a little too far" Callie gasped, her arms around Taylor's neck.

Taylor's fingers twitched against Callie's waist—part of her wanting to pull away, the other part wanting to press closer. The logical side of her brain screamed that this was reckless, that they were in Callie's childhood bedroom with her parents just downstairs. Finally she sighed and moved her hands away.

"Hormones suck" she pouted.

Callie giggled, pressing her forehead against Taylor's. "Yeah, well, welcome to girlhood." She traced a finger down Taylor's arm, leaving goosebumps in its wake.

A dinging text on her Taylor's phone finally broke the mood. Taylor pulled it from the carrier on her arm, checking it.

"Its my Mom. She's wondering where I am"

"I guess I can give you back," Callie said, taking her hand and walking back downstairs with her.

At the bottom of the stairs, she let go, not wanting to alert her parents. Callie was still very much in the closet.

"I'll see you at school on Monday?" Taylor announced. Then as she was going out the door, she shouted. "CYA MR. AND MRS.M!"

She ran back home, making it there in no time.

She was surprised to see Benny sitting on the porch.

Benny leaned against the porch railing with his usual cocky slouch, but his fingers tapped an uneven rhythm against the wood—nervous energy betraying his casual facade. His gaze locked onto Taylor's Gamma-enhanced figure the moment she rounded the corner, tracking her movements with an intensity that made her skin prickle.

Taylor slowed, not sure how this was going to go.

Benny was Tyler's friend but he was a bit of a horndog. She'd been avoiding him mostly, keeping their texts and calls pretty short. She wasn't sure how to act around him anymore. They became friends out of convenience, both of them bullied by the assholes of the school like Jason. Benny was that short, heavy set kid that everyone liked to use as a punching bag. He wasn't a bad guy but he talked an awful lot about wanting to "bang" this girl and that.

Upon seeing him there, she felt her skin crawl slightly.

Benny's fingers twitched against the porch railing as Taylor approached, his Adam's apple bobbing like a buoy in choppy water. "Damn, T—Taylor," he corrected himself with visible effort, eyes darting from her neon running shoes, up her running attire to the sweat-damp tendrils of hair clinging to her neck. "You look...wow."

"Was out for a run" she said, absently stretching.

"You run now?" he asked, incredulous.

Taylor shrugged. "Jason became an airhead, I became a runner"

Benny was staring at her exposed abs. "Those are real, right?"

Taylor fought back the urge to roll her eyes.

Taylor crossed her arms over her stomach, suddenly self-conscious under Benny’s stare. "Yeah, they're real. Just like the virus that gave them to me." She edged past him toward the and sat on the top step.

Benny sat down next to awkwardly, making sure there was at least a whole person of space between them.

"I don't bite" Taylor laughed, Benny awkwardly chuckled.

"Just trying to give you your space" Benny said nervously.

That's right. She forgot about that little bit. Even though Benny talked the talk as it were, he was actually terrified of girls. Well not terrified but he generally kept his distance from them. Pretty girls were even harder for him. Which meant...

Poor Benny.

Benny's fingers drummed against his knees—an erratic staccato that matched the nervous flicker of his eyes. "So uh," he cleared his throat, staring resolutely at the porch steps between them, "does it... you know... feel different?" His Adam's apple bobbed violently. "Down there?"

Taylor snorted, flicking a pebble off the step with her foot. "Yeah Benny, it feels exactly like having an entirely different set of genitalia would feel."

He paused for a moment. "What about up there?" He grabbed at imaginary boobs in front of his chest.

Taylor was annoyed and feeling devious. "How about I kiss you and you can find out yourself?"

Benny recoiled, almost falling off the porch.

Taylor burst out laughing.

"I'm not contagious anymore, bozo".

Benny recovered quickly but instead of sitting back down, he stood a foot away. "You're a horrible person, you know that?"

She raised an eyebrow. "Says the guy who just asked a girl about her boobs and..."

Benny waved his hands, interrupting her. "Ok, ok. I get it".

Taylor smirked. "Its a shame, I think you would have made a cute girl."

Benny took another step back, making the sign of the cross with his fingers "How do you know you're not contagious?"

Taylor smiled. "Well one they told me so and two, if I am, you'll have a new male bro to hang out with"

Benny looked confused for a second before it clicked. "Callie? You kissed Callie?" Taylor blushed. "When? How?"

Taylor threw a pebble at him. "A girl doesn't kiss and tell."

"Aww, c'mon dude" Benny whined, getting a look from Taylor. "Ummm, dudette?"

Taylor rolled her eyes, this time letting him see. Nope" she said, getting to her feet. "And don't go asking her either or else I might have to kick your ass".

She flexed a muscle to prove her point.

Benny stared. "Wait, you're ripped. Well not like ripped ripped but you've got one of those bods. How the hell did that happen?"

Taylor shrugged. "Woke up like this."

"Maybe I should get infected," Benny mumbled under his breath.

"I wouldn't try it" Taylor said "I can get periods now."

"Shit" Benny said, taking another step back.

"It could be worse," Taylor admitted, thinking of Jasmine.

Benny seemingly read her mind. "Have you seen her latest stream?"

Taylor nodded. While she didn't want to, it was like watching a car crash over and over again. Every stream, Jasmine seemed to slip further and further away from her previous self. It was scary to see her de-evolution. It was even scarier to think that a twist of fate could have made her the same way.

She shuddered. "The thought terrifies me."

Benny nodded. "It should terrify us all."

Taylor got a text from her Mom: *Dr. Jones called. They want to meet with you at the hospital tomorrow.*

"All good?" asked Benny.

Taylor shrugged. "Just another step in my new life as Taylor apparently."

******

The hospital corridor smelled like antiseptic and bad coffee, the kind that had been sitting in the pot since Friday. Taylor's sneakers squeaked against the linoleum as she followed her mother past the nurse's station—a sound that made her flinch every time. She'd never noticed how loud her footsteps could be before, how the sound bounced off these sterile walls.

They were supposed to meet Dr. Jones with another doctor from the CDC named Dr. Morris.

They met the two doctors in a secluded office room, probably belonging to one of the other doctors at the hospital.

Dr. Morris turned out to be a woman who looked like she'd been assembled from contradictions—early forties but with laugh lines deeper than her professional demeanor should allow, designer heels clicking against hospital tiles while her lab coat flapped with the urgency of someone perpetually late. She smelled faintly of lavender hand sanitizer and something sharper underneath, like burnt coffee left too long on a hotplate.

After they sat on a gray couch, Dr. Jones introduced her colleague.

Dr. Morris leaned forward, her fingers steepled beneath her chin. "First off, Taylor, I want you to know this isn't an evaluation." Her voice carried a warmth that clashed with the clinical white of the walls. "I'm just here to help people navigate what happens when their outsides stop matching their insides overnight." A chuckle escaped her, sudden and unexpected. "Though I'll admit, 'overnight gender-swapping virus' wasn't in my graduate school curriculum."

Taylor stared at the woman.

She was a shrink.

"You're a psychiatrist?" she asked, concerned.

Dr. Morris smiled. "Psychologist actually. I've been asked by the government to speak with you and others like you. To make sure you're adjusting properly"

Taylor leaned back into the couch, arms crossed. "I'm fine."

"I can see that and normally this would have been sooner but Dr. Jones felt you didn't need as much help because you had your sister guiding you" Dr. Morris was smiling as she talked.

"We're not here because we think you're not adjusting" Dr. Jones quickly added.

Dr. Morris' pen hovered over her notepad—the hesitation more telling than any note she might write. "Most Gamma patients experience some degree of dysphoria," she said carefully, eyes flicking to where Taylor's fingers tapped an uneven rhythm against her own knee. "But your file suggests you've adapted remarkably well. Almost... instinctively."

Taylor felt Dr. Morris' observation like a pinprick between her shoulder blades. She uncrossed her arms, forcing her hands to still against her thighs. "Guess I got lucky," she said, aiming for nonchalance but catching the edge of something sharper in her voice. The lavender sanitizer smell suddenly felt cloying.

"Very lucky" Dr. Morris admitted. "The virus has a way of rewriting some patients, making them completely different".

Like Jasmine, Taylor thought but didn't say it.

"Why didn't it change me?" she asked, curious.

Dr. Morris sighed. "Honestly we don't know." She set down her pad and pen. "As you're aware, there are three strains of the virus---Alpha, Beta and Gamma. In the beginning, Alpha was the only strain. It was slow and caused us a lot of problems. Then came Beta, faster but not nearly as effective as Gamma. Gamma is the real beauty. It only started to show its face a year ago and what's more, it has variants."

"Like me and Jasmine?" Taylor asked, Dr. Morris nodded.

"We're not entirely sure how it happens or why" Dr. Morris admitted. "Its why we're here now. The government is trying to figure it out. Between the three variants, yours does the least. You could almost say you and Jasmine are polar opposites in that regard."

Taylor quickly pictured Jasmine, on stream, acting like a ditz. 

She shuddered. "I can't imagine how she must be feeling".

"Normal actually" said Dr. Morris. "The virus rewrites you completely. She knows she was Jason, she knows how she was before but to her, it's like waking from a dream. Her new life is her life now."

Taylor thought about that. "Why didn't it happen to me?"

Dr. Morris sighed. "We don't know"

Taylor caught on quickly. "And that's why I'm here."

Dr. Morris smiled. "You're a smart one." She picked up her pad again. "I want to meet with you twice a week for the next few months. At the beginning and end of your school week. Three times a month we'll also meet as a group"

"A group?" she asked, confused. 

"You and the other two" she said "Jasmine and Henry from your school and the two others from Huntsville".

Henry? So that's what happened to what's-her-face. She felt bad not remembering the other victim but they'd never met before. 

She also wasn't sure she was so thrilled about being in a room with Jasmine.

Her mother grabbed her hand, sensing her unease.

"We don't want to put pressure on you" Dr. Jones finally spoke. "We just want to better understand what's going on. Even after all these years, we still don't understand it."

The way she said "years" made it sound like this had been going on forever. Taylor was sure The Bug had only been around for a decade or so.

She decided not to press it. 

Ok" she finally said. "I think they might actually help honestly. There are some things I'd like to understand too."

Her mother patted her hand, the doctors smiled and nodded. 

The meeting ended there. Dr. Jones and Dr. Morris thanked her and her mother for their time. 

They left the hospital. 

"You hungry?" her mother asked.

"Starving," Taylor admitted, feeling her stomach rumble.

Her mother smiled. "I'll go get the car and bring it around."

As her mother walked off, a text message dinged. Taylor pulled out her phone, expecting it to be from Kayla or her friends. What she didn't expected was a text from an Unknown Sender. She almost didn't open it but curiosity got the better of her.

She opened the text and almost gasped as she read:

I KNEW YOU WERE GOING TO BE GORGEOUS. 

A chill ran up Taylor's spine as realization dawned on her.

TO BE CONTINUED

Author’s note: As I’m sure all of you know, comments are life blood to an author. I’m not begging or demanding, but I certainly would appreciate anything you have to say (or ask). It doesn’t have to be long and involved, just give me your reaction to the story. Thanks in advance...EOF